Saturday, July 26, 2008
Friday, July 25, 2008
The employees free choice act
The Afl-Cio says that the bill is a non partisan bill.
In the Senate there are 47 co sponsors, all democrats.
In the House there are 234 co sponsors, all but 5 are democrats.
That sounds very partisan to me.
Here is what this bill is all about.
Does a ballot cast in private or a card signed in public better reveal a worker's true preference about whether to join a union? A private vote is the obvious answer, but organized labor has nonetheless made the misleadingly named Employee Free Choice Act (EFCA, H.R. 800) its highest legislative priority.
Recently, unions have switched the focus of their organizing operations from private balloting to publicly signed cards. These so-called card-check campaigns make it much easier for unions to organize workers, but most companies strongly resist the idea of denying their employees a vote. Unions now want the government to take away workers' right to vote and certify unions after only a card-check campaign. The Employee Free Choice Act would do this and more.
First, it requires the National Labor Relations Board to certify a union after a majority of a firm's workers has signed union cards, putting an end to almost all organizing elections: "if the [National Labor Relations] Board finds that a majority of the employees in a unit appropriate for bargaining has signed valid authorizations...the Board shall not direct an election but shall certify the individual or labor organization."[1]
Second, the EFCA requires companies and newly certified unions to enter binding arbitration if they cannot reach agreement on an initial contract after 90 days of negotiations.[2] Neither companies nor employees could appeal the arbitrator's ruling, and the contract would last for two years.
Third, H.R. 800 would dramatically increase the penalties for unfair labor practices committed by employers, but not unions, during an organizing drive.[3]
Union activists contend that the act would protect workers' freedom to freely choose to join a union. However, workers' best defense against harassment and intimidation by either a union or an employer is a secret-ballot election in which neither knows how any individual worker voted.
To protect American workers, Congress should:
* Protect workers' privacy during organizing drives and guarantee every worker the right to vote in a private-ballot election;
* Ensure that workers hear from both sides during an organizing drive and have time to reflect on their choice so they can make an informed and considered decision; and
* Protect the right of workers and employers to bargain collectively without having government officials unilaterally impose employment contracts on them.
The Employee Free Choice Act would strip workers of their fundamental rights and leave them more vulnerable to pressure than before.
The Case Against Card Check
America's labor laws are grounded in the principle that workers should have the freedom to decide whether to bargain collectively with their employers. The law protects workers from retaliation for deciding to join or to reject a union. A company must recognize a union supported by a majority of its workers and may not recognize a union that lacks majority support.
Under current law, union organizers can request an organizing election once 30 percent of a company's workers sign union authorization cards in a "card check."[4] This constitutes a "showing of interest," and the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) then orders that a secret-ballot election be held. These elections usually take place 39 days after the NLRB receives the cards.[5] Unions win about 60 percent of these certification elections.[6] Once the NLRB certifies the union as the employees' exclusive representative, the employer and the union begin negotiating a collective bargaining agreement. Through a process of mutual give and take, the two sides reach an agreement over wages and working conditions.
A company may choose to recognize a union that the NLRB has not certified if the union's organizers present union cards signed by a majority of the company's workers. Unions find it much easier to sign up workers when workers' choices are made in public. However, as the Supreme Court affirmed in NLRB v. Gissel Packing Co. (1969), publicly signed cards are "inherently unreliable," and a company may always request a private vote to confirm that its employees actually want to unionize. Companies usually insist on giving their workers the privacy of the voting booth and refuse to recognize unions without an election.
Fundamental Right to Vote in Privacy. The misleadingly named Employee Free Choice Act would end this system. The act would require companies to recognize a union without a private election once organizers submit union cards signed by a majority of workers in a company. This effectively replaces private organizing ballots with publicly signed cards.
Abolishing elections deprives workers of a fundamental democratic right. Elections guarantee that all workers can express their views on whether they want to belong to a union. Under card check, however, workers who have not been contacted by union organizers have no say in whether their workplace organizes. If organizers collect cards from a majority of workers, all workers must join the union without a vote.
Equally important, a democratic election with private ballots ensures that all workers can express their desires without fear of social stigma or retribution. With a private ballot, no one else knows how any individual worker voted, and workers can express their intentions without outside pressure. For these reasons, the government protects the right of all Americans to vote for elected officials in private. American workers have the same right, and it should not be taken away because it impedes union organizing.
No Elections. Supporters of H.R. 800 contend that it would not prohibit private balloting but would simply give workers the option to choose whether to engage in a private vote or a card check.[7] This argument is very misleading. Under the EFCA, workers could not choose between different organizing methods. The legislation requires the NLRB to certify a union without holding an election once organizers submit cards signed by a majority of workers. Those workers would never have the option to sign a card calling for an election that does not also count toward a card-check majority.
Under current law, an election occurs when union organizers hand in union cards signed by at least 30 percent of a company's workers. If they handed in cards from less than 50 percent of the workers, this would fall short of the EFCA's majority requirement and so would lead to a traditional private election. However, the choice of organizing method would belong solely to union organizers, not workers.
An election would occur only when union organizers submit cards signed by a minority of workers; but union organizers rarely call for an election without signed cards from a majority of workers, because they know that unions usually lose these elections. The AFL-CIO's internal studies show that unions win only 8 percent of elections that are called after less than 40 percent of workers have signed cards.[8] With guaranteed certification under card check, organizers would almost never call for an election once they have obtained enough signatures. Workers would lose their right to a private vote as soon as union organizers collected cards from a majority of employees.
Threats and Intimidation. A private vote is more than a fundamental democratic right; it also protects workers and ensures that they can express their true views. An election ensures that workers can hear both sides, have time for reflection, and then vote their conscience without pressure or fear of retaliation. These safeguards disappear when workers must organize by publicly signing a card. Card checks fail to gauge accurately workers' desire to join a union.
Private ballots ensure that workers' decisions about whether to join a union remain private so that no one can threaten workers for making the "wrong" choice. With card checks, both the company and the union know how workers voted, and this exposes workers to the possibility of retaliation. Though threats are illegal, they still occur, and not all of them are made by employers.
A union has a direct financial stake in the outcome of an organizing drive. If the workers organize, the union will collect 1 percent to 2 percent of their wages in dues. These high stakes lead some organizers to cross the line and threaten workers who refuse to sign union cards. Two examples illustrate this problem.
* In one card-check campaign investigated by the NLRB, a pro-union employee threatened a co-worker by saying that if she refused to sign the union card, "the union would come and get her children and that it would also slash her tires."[9]
* In another case, Thomas Built Buses agreed to recognize a United Auto Workers (UAW) card-check drive in exchange for significant advance wage concessions from the union. Employee Jeff Ward successfully challenged the sweetheart deal before the NLRB and forced the company to allow its workers to vote.[10] In response, the UAW posted flyers around the plant with Mr. Ward's home address, home phone number, and a map to his house. The flyers stated, "Jeff Ward lives here. Go tell him how you really feel about the union."[11]
Forcing workers to express their beliefs in public leaves them vulnerable to threats like these and makes card checks much less reliable than private ballots for revealing employees' true wishes.
Sales Pitch. Even when union organizers do not threaten workers, card checks often do not reveal workers' free and considered choice about joining a union because workers do not hear both sides' pitches and lack time for reflection. Instead, card checks force workers to choose in a high-pressure sales situation.
In a card-check campaign, groups of organizers meet with individual workers at their homes or elsewhere and press them to sign a union authorization card. Organizers do not simply present the arguments for and against joining the union and then ask for a worker's support. Instead, they employ psychological manipulation to induce workers to sign after hearing their pitch. One former union organizer described the process in congressional testimony:
[Organizers] are trained to perform a five-part house call strategy that includes: Introductions, Listening, Agitation, Union Solution, and Commitment. The goal of the organizer is to quickly establish a trust relationship with the worker, move from talking about what their job entails to what they would like to change about their job, agitate them by insisting that management won't fix their workplace problems without a union and finally convincing the worker to sign a card....
Typically, if a worker signed a card, it had nothing to do with whether a worker was satisfied with the job or felt they were treated fairly by his or her boss.... [I]f someone told me that she was perfectly contented at work, enjoyed her job and liked her boss, I would look around her house and ask questions based on what I noticed: "wow, I bet on your salary, you'll never be able to get your house remodeled," or, "so does the company pay for day care?" These were questions to which I knew the answer and could use to make her feel that she was cheated by her boss. Five minutes earlier she had just told me that she was feeling good about her work situation.[12]
Signing a card after this kind of manipulation does not reflect an employee's unfettered and considered choice.
Only One Side of the Story. Organizers have a job to do: recruit new dues-paying members to their union. They are not paid to inform workers of the downsides of unionizing. Instead, they make the strongest case they can for joining a union and ask workers to sign their card right then. A former union organizer explained the process:
We rarely showed workers what an actual union contract looked like because we knew that it wouldn't necessarily reflect what a worker would want to see. We were trained to avoid topics such as dues increases, strike histories, etc. and to constantly move the worker back to what the organizer identified as his or her "issues" during the first part of the house call.[13]
Union organizers understandably boast about the benefits unions bring members, but they do not bring up the six-figure salaries that union bosses pay themselves from members' dues, the fact that hundreds of union officials have been convicted of racketeering in the past five years, or the role that unions' inflexibility has played in driving some companies into bankruptcy. Instead, union organizers make their pitch and ask workers to sign their cards immediately. By making card-check organizing the norm, the Employee Free Choice Act would prevent workers from making informed decisions.
Harassing Holdouts. With card checks, union organizers know who has and has not signed up to join the union, allowing them to repeatedly approach and pressure reluctant workers who declined to sign after the first sales pitch. With this technique, a worker's decision to join the union is binding, while a decision to opt out only means "not this time."
Moreover, some organizers go beyond pressure to outright harassment. Hotel workers in Los Angeles, for example, had to seek an injunction against union organizers after groups of eight to ten organizers harassed employees on their homes' porches late at night.[14] A labor lawyer explained what happened to Trico Marine employees during a card-check drive:
Some employees, when solicited at their homes by union representatives, said, "No," to signing a card; yet, they reported repeated, frequent home visits by union representatives continuing to try to secure their signatures, and they complained to the company of this harassment. After 8 visits, one vessel officer in southern Louisiana had an arrest warrant issued against a union organizer.... Employees volunteered that they signed cards just to stop the pressure and harassment.[15]
A card signed after union organizers' eighth pitch to a reluctant worker hardly reflects that worker's true opinion; nor does a card that is signed just to prevent further harassment.
Organizing Without Majority Support. Card-check campaigns expose workers to union threats and harassment and pressure them to commit after hearing a one-sided union sales pitch. Cards collected under those circumstances often do not reflect employees' free choice. Consequently card-check allows union activists to organize plants where a majority of workers oppose the union.
For example, Metaldyne Corporation agreed to allow the UAW to organize its workers with a card-check campaign in exchange for concessions at the bargaining table. The UAW soon collected union cards from a majority of workers, and Metaldyne agreed to recognize the UAW as its employees' representative. Soon afterwards, a majority of the company's workers submitted a signed petition stating that they did not want a union and requesting that the NLRB decertify their union.[16] The signed union cards did not reflect the employees' true preferences.
Unions Know Card Checks Are Unreliable. Despite their public arguments in favor of the EFCA and card checks, union organizers candidly admit in private that card checks do not reflect workers' true beliefs. Union organizing manuals have long cautioned organizers that a worker's signature on a union card does not mean that he or she wants to join a union or will vote for the union in the election. The AFL-CIO's 1961 Guidebook for Union Organizers states:
NLRB pledge cards are at best a signifying of interest at a given moment. Sometimes they are signed to "get the union off my back"... Whatever the reason, there is no guarantee of anything in a signed NLRB pledge card except that it will count towards an NLRB election.[17]
Union organizers also acknowledge that a card-check campaign allows them to organize workplaces without workers' majority support. United Food and Commercial Workers organizer Joe Crump openly admits that with card check, "You don't need a majority or even 30% support among employees."[18] Crump instructs organizers not to worry that aggressive campaigning for a company to skip an election might turn workers against the union, because "if you had massive employee support, you probably would be conducting a traditional organizing [election] campaign."[19]
Metaldyne was not an unusual case. Unions regularly submit publicly signed authorization cards from a large majority of a company's workers only to see the workers reject the union in the privacy of the voting booth. In a study of organizing campaigns, the AFL-CIO admitted that "it is not until the union obtains signatures from 75% or more of the unit that the union has more than a 50% likelihood of winning the election."[20]
Unions Allege Abuses and Imbalances. It is difficult to argue for stripping workers of their right to a private vote. To justify putting an end to organizing elections, unions argue that the elections take place "in an inherently and intensely coercive environment" and are stacked against workers who want to join a union.[21]
Unions allege that companies systematically fire pro-union workers, threaten to shut down if their workers unionize, and use stalling tactics to delay holding votes. At the same time, say the activists, companies bombard their workers with anti-union messages at work while union organizers do not have access to workers to make their case. They also claim that it takes so long for the NLRB to investigate violations that employers routinely ignore laws protecting workers.[22] In the words of one labor activist, government-supervised secret-ballot organizing elections "look more like the discredited practices of rogue regimes abroad than like anything we would call American."[23]
If such abuses were occurring, depriving workers of a private vote would do almost nothing to stop them. However, the unions' allegations are either factually false or highly misleading. The facts show that employers rarely violate the law in organizing drives and that, if anything, NLRB election procedures favor unions: Unions win 61 percent of all organizing elections.[24]
Illegal Firings Rare. Union activists argue that Congress should replace organizing elections with card checks because employers regularly fire union supporters during organizing election campaigns in order to intimidate the remaining workers.[25] They claim that this happens in one-quarter of organizing campaigns and that there were "31,358 cases in 2005 of illegal firings and other discrimination against workers for exercising their federally protected labor law rights."[26]
If union activists' claims are correct, card checks would actually make it easier for companies to fire union supporters. Companies currently do not know how individual workers plan to vote in the privacy of the voting booth, but a union card signed in public is an entirely different matter. If the practice of systematically firing workers who want to unionize is widespread, then the government should not strip those workers of their privacy by informing employers of exactly who has elected to unionize.
In fact, however, the activists' claims are false. Illegal firings of union supporters are rare. Most unfair labor practice complaints that unions brought before the NLRB in 2005 were either withdrawn or dismissed.[27] The NLRB found substantiated evidence of illegal firings in just 2.7 percent of organizing election campaigns that took place that year.[28]
Misleading Numbers. Unions justify their claims of widespread illegal firings by using unreliable data from biased sources and by misrepresenting government statistics. Their claim that companies fire workers in one-quarter of organizing drives, for example, comes from a survey of union organizers that was conducted by a former union organizer.[29] Union organizers are not an impartial source, and actual government investigations reveal little evidence of the employer misconduct they allege.
Even more misleading is the claim that "illegal firings and other discrimination against workers" occurred 31,358 times in 2005. The number comes from the 2005 annual report of the National Labor Relations Board.[30] The report shows that the NLRB ordered employers to pay that many workers back pay in 2005, but the NLRB awards back pay to resolve many types of disputes, only a few of which involve intimidation or organizing campaigns.
For example, if a company unilaterally changed working conditions by reducing hours to cut costs without first negotiating with the union, the NLRB would order the company to return to the status quo and bargain the changes with the union. The NLRB could also require the company to provide back pay to workers as though the changes never occurred by paying them for the hours that they would have worked had the company not reduced working hours. Asserting that all or even most awards of back pay are due to intimidation, fraud, or illegal firings during organizing campaigns is simply false.
If a company illegally fires a worker for supporting a union during an election campaign, the NLRB will order it to reinstate that worker in addition to providing back pay. While the numbers of workers reinstated and awarded back pay would be the same if these remedies were due to illegal firings, government records show that reinstatement is far less common than back pay. The NLRB ordered just 2,008 workers reinstated in 2005, a number that includes workers who were illegally fired for other causes, such as discussing salary with their co-workers.[31] Union activists' claim that employers fired or discriminated against more than 31,000 employees for trying to organize in 2005 reflects either a complete misunderstanding or misrepresentation of what the NLRB's data really represent.
No Cure for Illegal Threats. Labor activists claim that employers regularly attempt to intimidate workers by threatening to shut down or move plants if workers unionize and argue that card checks could curtail this intimidation.[32] Union organizers say that employers make such threats in half of all organizing campaigns, although they rarely follow through.[33] But such threats are already illegal and are grounds for setting aside an election.
Card checks would also do nothing to prevent companies from making these threats. Abolishing private elections does not address the problem of employers making empty threats to their workers. Companies can deliver illegal threats just as effectively whether employees vote in private or sign up for a union in public. Union activists acknowledge this fact.[34]
Timely Investigation. Union activists agree that workers' legal protections look good on paper, but they claim that it takes so long for the government to investigate violations that these protections are meaningless in practice.[35] The AFL-CIO argues that "in 50 percent of the decisions issued by the NLRB in 2002 in unfair labor practice charge cases, workers waited more than 889 days for the NLRB to reach a decision."[36]
This claim is highly misleading. The National Labor Relations Board is labor law's equivalent of the U.S. Supreme Court. Only 3 percent of labor cases make it to the NLRB, and many of those embody novel legal issues, not the routine enforcement of the law.[37] Most cases are either settled by the parties or handled by lower levels of the NLRB bureaucracy.
It takes an NLRB regional director a median of only 95 days, or three months, to investigate an unfair labor practice charge, determine whether it has merit, and file a formal "complaint."[38] Only 13 percent of all cases reach that stage.[39] Fully 87 percent are closed before the complaint stage, either dismissed for lack of merit or resolved by settlements in which the company makes restitution. Cases that are not dismissed or settled take a median of three months from the filing of the complaint to the administrative law judge's decision. Only 5 percent of cases, overall, reach that stage.[40]
Ninety-five percent of all alleged violations of worker rights are settled through procedures that typically take between three to six months. That is no reason to take away workers' right to a private vote.
Delays Rare. Unions also allege that, in addition to illegally threatening and firing workers, employers use legal maneuvers to delay holding organizing elections. They claim that companies file baseless objections with the NLRB in order to drag out election campaigns for months. This, they say, gives employers more time to intimidate their employees and causes workers to lose confidence in the union.[41] Labor activists argue that to prevent interminable delays before a vote, the government should replace private ballots with public union cards that would not be subject to delays.
The unions' claims, however, are simply false. The typical organizing election takes place 39 days after union organizers file an election petition. Over 94 percent of organizing elections take place within eight weeks after organizers have filed a petition.[42] Eight weeks is not an unreasonable delay for a decision that demands consideration by workers and that could affect them for years. Congress should not strip workers of their right to a private vote because labor activists think eight weeks is too long to wait for an organizing election.
Rights of Unions and Employers Balanced by Law. Unions claim that employers have an unfair advantage during organizing election campaigns. They argue that the system makes it too difficult for workers to organize, even when employers follow the law, because unions and employers do not have equal access to workers. They point out that management can campaign against unionizing all day long during working hours, while unions may do so only during break times. They say that employees cannot freely choose union membership when they do not get to hear the union case and that card checks would fix this problem.[43]
This argument is also misleading. The law balances the rights of unions and employers during organizing elections to ensure that workers can hear from both sides. Generally, union organizers may not campaign when workers are on company time, but organizers may speak during unpaid time at work, such as breaks, unless the company has a policy prohibiting all solicitation--not just solicitation by unions--on its premises.
In addition, the government requires companies to provide union organizers with a complete and accurate list of all employees' names and addresses within seven days of the NLRB's order to conduct an election. If the company refuses, the NLRB will set aside the election and order a re-vote.[44] Union organizers are free to contact employees at home or by phone to make their case, but employers may not do so.[45] The law guarantees unions the opportunity to make their case to employees--just not when companies pay those employees to work.
The Employee Free Choice Act would in reality make it more difficult for unions to contact workers to make their case. Employees would still spend an average of 40 hours a week at their place of work with or without an election. If organizers did not file for an election, however, employers would have no obligation to provide them with the list of employee names and addresses. Without that list, organizers would have less access to workers to argue in favor of joining a union. If employers truly have unfair access to employees and unions do not have the opportunity to make their case, card check proposals that would make it harder for union organizers to meet with workers are not the solution.
Card Check Would Not Counter Alleged Abuses. Unions also object to the fact that employers can campaign against organizing and present workers with arguments against joining a union at the workplace. AFL-CIO president John Sweeney complains that employers require "supervisors to shovel anti-union propaganda to the employees whose schedules, evaluations and advancement they control" and force "workers to attend one-sided, anti-union meetings where management can legally fire pro-union workers who speak out."[46] Unions say that card checks would remedy this problem.
If employers' campaigns against unionizing were a serious problem, card-check laws that force workers to reveal their preferences in public would not solve it. The First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution guarantees employers the right to present their views to their workers. So long as they avoid threats, employers would still be able to hold "captive audience" meetings and "shovel anti-union propaganda" to their workers just as effectively when ballots are public as they could when they are private.
However, employer campaigns against unionizing benefit workers by informing them of the downsides of joining a union. Supervisors, for example, often hold group meetings where they inform workers of the potential costs of union membership. This may be the only time that workers hear why they might not want to join. Union organizers will not tell workers these things. Unions train organizers to avoid topics like dues increases and strike histories that could persuade workers to reject the union.[47] Employers should provide their workers with the other side of the story. That is how democracy works: Voters make an informed decision in private after both sides make their strongest case.
Few Workers Want to Organize. Union activists contend that the low level of unionization in the United States proves that elections do not reflect workers' free choice. They argue that most American workers actually want to join a union. They back this up with polling numbers showing that 53 percent of non-union workers, or 57 million workers, would like to belong to a union.[48]
However those numbers are highly suspect. The AFL-CIO commissioned the poll. Peter Hart, a Democratic pollster, conducted it. The poll itself remains unpublished, and the AFL-CIO has not revealed the questions or polling methodologies used.
Publicly publishedpolls conducted by nonpartisan pollsters show the opposite: Relatively few non-union workers want general representation. Zogby polling shows that, by a margin of more than 3 to 1, non-union workers do not want to belong to a labor union.[49] Because a union must win the support of a majority of a company's workers to win recognition, the fact that relatively few workers belong to a union is not surprising.
Workers Disagree with Union Claims. Labor activists claim to speak for American workers, but workers disagree with the claims unions make on their behalf. Contrary to union claims of widespread corporate intimidation, Zogby polling shows that 71 percent of union members believe that the current private-ballot process is fair, versus only 13 percent who disagree. Nor do union members want to lose their right to a private vote. Fully 78 percent of union members favor keeping the current system over replacing it with one that provides less privacy.[50]
The vast majority of Americans side with union members and not union bosses, believing that workers should have the choice to keep their views on organizing private. Fully 89 percent of Americans believe that a worker's ultimate choice should be kept private.[51]
XREFIn addition, a large majority of workers also oppose any effort to replace organizing elections with publicly signed cards. A recent McLaughlin poll indicates that 79 percent of Americans oppose card-check legislation that would end private-ballot elections.[52] About 66 percent of union members agree and think that companies should never be allowed to skip private-ballot elections before they recognize a union.[53] The very employees that union activists claim to represent oppose replacing private-ballot elections with card checks.
The Real Goal: Improving Union Finances. Unions know that private ballots best reveal workers' desires and that card-check organizing would not address, and could exacerbate, the alleged shortcomings of private elections. Yet they still favor card checks over private ballots. This is because their real aim is to reverse the labor movement's long-term decline. Unions are harder to sell to workers today than they were in the manufacturing economy of two generations ago. Today's jobs require unique skills and talents that do not lend themselves to general representation. Most workers in the modern economy do not feel that union membership provides benefits worth the 1 percent to 2 percent of their salary that they would have to pay in dues.
Consequently, union membership has fallen steadily since the 1950s, and unions lost another 326,000 members in 2006. Today, just 12 percent of workers belong to unions--less than at any point since Franklin D. Roosevelt's Administration.[54] Fewer members translates into less dues money and increased financial hardship for organized labor.
Unions seek to reverse that trend, and they know that card check allows them to organize workplaces without workers' majority support. Unions want the Employee Free Choice Act because it would make it easier to recruit dues-paying members, not because it would somehow defend workers' right to choose freely to unionize.
Congress Should Protect Private Ballots. A worker's best protection from pressure when deciding to join a union is the privacy of the voting booth. Card-check campaigns expose workers to potential intimidation. Even when organizers obey the law, they give workers one-sided sales pitches and press them to commit to the union immediately, without time for reflection or the opportunity to hear both sides.
Workers deserve better. To protect workers' rights and ensure that they can make informed and considered decisions, Congress should prohibit card-check organizing. Congress should stop companies from waiving their employees' right to vote by requiring a private-ballot election before a union is certified as the workers' exclusive representative.
The Case Against Binding Arbitration
The Employee Free Choice Act also provides for the use of binding arbitration to resolve bargaining impasses. Currently, negotiations on an initial contract following unionization are treated much the same as any other contract: The parties negotiate in good faith until they settle on terms. If they fail to do so, the union may call a strike, and the employer may implement its last offer or even lock out workers.
In a section misleadingly titled "Facilitating Initial Collective Bargaining Agreements," the EFCA provides that after 90 days of bargaining on an initial union contract, either party may request mediation by the Federal Mediation and Conciliation Service (FMCS). Thirty days later, if the parties are still unable to settle on a contract or agree to extend negotiations, the FMCS:
shall refer the dispute to an arbitration board established in accordance with such regulations as may be prescribed by the Service. The arbitration panel shall render a decision settling the dispute and such decision shall be binding upon the parties for a period of two years, unless amended during such period by written consent of the parties.[55]
Arbitration can be a valuable method for resolving disputes and is frequently used in labor relations. Both management and labor have found it useful to bring in a trusted third party to evaluate grievances that might arise under an existing contract, a process that allows them to avoid the costs and delays of litigation. In this sense, arbitration is a valuable alternative to the court system.
Given the disruption and even violence that can accompany strikes, it may seem attractive to avoid them by having a neutral third party step in and determine the wages and other terms of employment when unions and employers fail to reach an agreement. This process is referred to as "binding arbitration," and many states use it to resolve bargaining impasses involving public employees who are not allowed to go on strike.
But unlike other situations in which arbitration works well, in binding arbitration, the arbitrator does not simply take the place of a judge in a courtroom. Instead of applying the law or the terms of an existing agreement to settle a dispute, the arbitrator has the task of figuring out what a fair agreement should look like. This is a much more difficult and risky process and one that unions and management seldom agree to on their own.[56]
While the EFCA purports to "facilitat[e] Initial Collective Bargaining Agreements," it does the opposite, leaving both parties subject to the decisions of an arbitration panel that one side or both sides may not want rather than encouraging them to arrive at a mutually satisfactory contract. In place of an agreement, the EFCA would impose the educated guess of a government-appointed arbitrator, leaving management and workers to deal with the consequences.
Binding Arbitration's Bad Record. The EFCA says little about the specific process of binding arbitration, leaving it to the FMCS to determine how an arbitration panel will be chosen, what sort of evidence it will consider and when, and what process it will use to make a decision. The state of Michigan uses binding arbitration to resolve bargaining impasses involving public safety workers, such as police officers, firefighters, and emergency medical technicians employed by county and municipal governments. The process in Michigan is fairly typical, and the experience of this state is a reasonable guide to the risks involved in binding arbitration.
When negotiations break down to the point that binding arbitration is needed, Michigan law calls for a three-member panel to determine wages and other terms of employment. The government employer and union each appoint a panelist, while the third, a neutral arbitrator who serves as chairman, is chosen from a list provided by the state.[57] Because the members appointed by the union and the employer can be counted on to support their own sides, the binding arbitration process ultimately hinges on the opinions of this neutral member.
Under the Michigan statute, binding arbitration is supposed to go quickly. Assembling the arbitration panel should take less than three weeks. Once the panel is named, the first hearing should be held within 15 days, and hearings are supposed to be wrapped up 30 days after they commence.[58]
In reality, the process takes much longer. In the early 1990s, only one out of every six binding arbitration cases was resolved within 300 days of a petition's being filed. The pace of arbitration has improved since then, but not by much.[59] A review of 29 binding arbitration cases resolved in 2005 and 2006 showed that only seven--fewer than one out of four--were resolved within 300 days. On average, binding arbitration takes almost 15 months from the date that a request is filed to the date that a decision is reached.[60]
Unaccountable Arbitrators. The Employee Free Choice Act would put control of wages and working conditions in the hands of unaccountable government officials. Arbitrators do not have to live with the consequences of their decisions. Michigan law lists a number of criteria that the panel is to consider in making a decision, such as the ability of the government employer to pay, comparisons with similar communities, trends in private-sector employment, and the local cost of living. Nonetheless, in the end, the process is very arbitrary; there is no step-by-step analysis that an arbitrator should go through. Arbitrators decide what weights to put on these factors with virtually no risk that their rulings will be overturned by the courts.
An ill-conceived arbitrator's award can have severe consequences for both communities and employees. For instance, an arbitrator's 1978 decision to award Detroit police a cost-of-living allowance--an expensive item given the high inflation of the late 1970s--threw a precarious city budget out of balance. After the state courts refused to overturn the award, the city was forced to lay off 20 percent of its police force. Crime rates, which had been declining, increased dramatically. Even those officers who kept their jobs paid a price; in 1981, the city and the police union agreed to a wage freeze.[61]
Unlike a local government, a business cannot raise taxes or turn to a higher level of government for financial assistance if an arbitrator's decision goes against it. Competition in the free market means that if an arbitrator miscalculates and raises wages too high, a company cannot raise its prices to compensate for the decision without the risk of losing customers. An ill-advised arbitrator's ruling can easily lead to financial difficulty and layoffs. Yet arbitrators face no penalty if a miscalculation sends a company into bankruptcy or cheats workers out of a wage increase they would have earned. Unlike binding arbitration, with collective bargaining, both sides have a stake in making the final agreement work.
Stifling Competitiveness and Innovation. As damaging as an ill-advised arbitrator's decision might be for a local government, binding arbitration does even greater damage in the private sector by stifling competitiveness and innovation.
Unlike the typical arbitrator's decision in government, the EFCA would apply only to the initial negotiations after a union is recognized. This means that the arbitrator would not be able to look to prior collective bargaining agreements for guidance.
Without prior agreements to use as a baseline, a conscientious arbitrator will be more likely to base his or her decision on the practices of comparable companies, but this has drawbacks too. A company with its own distinctive business model could be forced to adopt the practices of its competitors, forcing it to give up its unique approach to its business and give up its competitive advantages.
If the binding arbitration process turns out to be a slow one, as it often is in Michigan government, business owners will be forced to prepare for retroactive back-pay awards while they wait for overdue decisions. This ties up funds that cannot be used to invest in new equipment, and these funds cannot be offered as incentives to lure new workers because back-pay awards go exclusively to the existing workforce.
Extreme Demands. Binding arbitration can affect the entire bargaining process. It is a common practice for both employers and unions in Michigan to make extreme proposals during bargaining with an eye toward the possibility of arbitration. The arbitrator may know little about how a specific corporation stays competitive and may not have the experience necessary to discern which demands are so extreme that they would not be agreed to in collective bargaining.
This complicates collective bargaining, as negotiators must agree to set aside these demands before they can get to negotiating on more realistic provisions. If negotiations break down and an arbitrator is brought in, the arbitrator might not be able to see through the posturing and could include these demands as part of his or her decision. The arbitrator could force companies to:
* Participate in multi-employer union pension plans, many of which are now underfunded;
* Guarantee no layoffs irrespective of worker productivity; and
* Adopt uncompetitive work rules and production quotas.
These policies would cripple the competitiveness of American firms. In addition, binding arbitration is not without drawbacks for workers. Because of the way that binding arbitration fits in the overall scheme of the National Labor Relations Act, the arbitration process is likely to make unions less accountable to those whom it is supposed to represent and protect.
Stuck with an Unwanted Union. Binding arbitration could leave workers stuck with a union that they do not want, such as one that failed them by not accepting a better offer from management when it had the chance or by putting on a poor presentation in front of the arbitration panel. Workers would then be stuck paying union dues out of their disappointing wages.
The National Labor Relations Act (NLRA) does provide for the removal of a union that has lost worker support. The process is similar to that used to bring a union in today. When opponents collect signatures from 30 percent of their co-workers, they can petition for a decertification vote. The same rules apply if workers want to bring in a different union. Employees who have a problem with the union cannot just go out and start collecting signatures, however. They must wait until the law presents them with an opening. The EFCA and decisions of the NLRB have created several "bars" to decertification.
First, there is the certification bar. After a union is recognized, workers must wait a full year before they have an opportunity to vote to remove the union or bring in another one. During this time, the union has its opportunity to negotiate its first contract. Then comes the contract bar. Once a collective bargaining agreement is reached, a decertification election may not be held while that contract is in place, for up to three years.[62] There is no provision in the EFCA that would prevent the NLRB from treating an arbitrator's ruling as a contract and barring decertification petitions while one is in effect.
Workers Lose All Say. Still, the current law does allow workers to remove a union if negotiations drag on too long, and depending on the rules of the union, workers can vote down a contract if they are not satisfied with its terms. Workers also have the right to honor a strike or to refrain from striking, as they think best, if the union calls for its members to cease working. All of these rights serve to give workers some degree of autonomy and some control over the union and in the workplace.
With binding arbitration in place, however, these rights are likely to be gone or rendered moot. The EFCA does not provide for workers to terminate the binding arbitration process. No matter how long arbitration drags on, the workers will remain stuck with it. Once an arbitrator is called in, his or her word will be final, so a vote to reject the contract is out of the question. With a mediator-imposed contract, workers would lose all say in the workplace. They could not even ask their supervisors for a raise for good performance beyond what the contract allowed. And in states that do not have right-to-work protections, the arbitrator's ruling is almost guaranteed to have a forced-dues provision, because forced dues are relatively common in collective bargaining agreements, and arbitrators are likely to follow this widespread precedent.
Since the EFCA also makes card-check certification mandatory, it would create a system in which union officials can finagle or bully approval from workers who do not really want them there, and those workers would be obliged to wait several years, and pay union dues for two years, before having any chance to get rid of the unwanted union. Such a state of affairs would make a mockery of one of the basic premises of American labor law: The will of the majority of workers should determine whether or not a union will represent them.
The Case Against Differential Treatment
The third and final component of the Employee Free Choice Act has received the least attention. Section 4 dramatically increases the penalties against employers for unfair labor practices conducted during an organizing drive and requires the NLRB to prioritize investigation of those cases.
Currently, when an employer illegally discriminates against a worker for supporting a union during an organizing campaign, the law requires the employer to provide that worker full back pay. The EFCA would require the employer to provide triple back pay and would add a civil penalty of up to $20,000 for most unfair labor practices committed by employers during organizing drives. It would also require the NLRB to give preliminary investigation of those unfair labor practices "priority over all other cases." The EFCA would not, however, increase penalties for unfair labor practices committed by unions against either workers or businesses.
Misrepresenting the Problem of Union Coercion. Union supporters contend that this differential treatment is justified because unions almost never intimidate or coerce workers during organizing campaigns. Nancy Schiffer, AFL-CIO Associate General Counsel, presents the unions' case:
Is coercion in the signing of authorizations a legitimate concern? A recent review of 113 cases cited by the HR Policy Association as "involving" fraud and coercion identified only 42 decisions since the Act's inception that actually found coercion, fraud or misrepresentation in the signing of union authorization forms. That's less than one case per year.[63]
This misrepresents the HR Policy Association's findings to paint a completely false picture of union coercion. In a policy brief on the EFCA, the association included a list of 113 NLRB decisions involving "union deception and/or coercion in obtaining authorization card signatures."[64] Union activists examined those cases closely and found that only 42 of those 113 NLRB cases directly concerned those issues, but that does not mean that there have been only 42 cases of union coercion over the past 60 years. It means only that the National Labor Relations Board has decided 42 cases concerning forgery or intimidation in the obtaining of union cards during that time. These are two different things.
As described above, the NLRB is labor law's equivalent of the Supreme Court and hears only a small proportion of labor cases. The union argument makes as much sense as examining 60 years of Supreme Court rulings, finding 42 that involved arson, and then claiming that there had been only 42 cases of arson in the United States during that time.
Union Coercion a Real Problem. In fact, union coercion and intimidation are not as rare as labor activists contend. Thousands of unfair labor practices cases have been filed against unions since 2000, including 1,417 for coercive statements, 416 for violence and assaults, 546 for harassment, and 1,325 for threatening statements.[65] Many of these cases did not involve election campaigns, and the unions were not found guilty in every case, but these numbers show that workers have a real problem with union intimidation.
Workers have a right to decide whether to join a union without being subjected to coercion or pressure. Threats and intimidation from either employers or unions are equally repugnant. By increasing penalties against only employers, the EFCA sends the message that union threats are less of an injustice than employer threats. Prioritizing cases of employer discrimination forces workers who face union intimidation to wait longer for justice.
The law should not make this distinction. A worker assaulted by union members for refusing to sign a union card has been subjected to no less an injustice done than has a worker fired by his employer for signing a union card. If Congress believes stiffer labor law penalties are needed, those higher penalties should apply equally to employers and to unions. Cases of union violence and employer intimidation should also have equal priority.
Conclusion
The Employee Free Choice Act would strip American workers of their right to a private-ballot vote, require companies to submit to binding arbitration, and increase penalties for unfair labor practices committed by employers but not by unions. Each of these provisions would be bad for American workers.
Congress should instead protect the privacy of American workers and guarantee their right to vote in an election before joining a union. Congress should also guarantee every worker the opportunity to hear arguments from both sides and time to reflect before voting.
Replacing organizing elections with public card checks is a move in the wrong direction. Card checks expose workers to threats and intimidation from unions and employers. Even when organizers obey the law, card checks still leave workers vulnerable to peer pressure and harassment. Organizers know who has and has not signed, so they repeatedly return to pressure holdouts to change their minds. They give workers a high-pressure sales pitch that only presents the union side and press them to commit immediately without time for reflection. Cards signed under these circumstances do not accurately reflect an employee's true intentions--a fact that unions privately acknowledge.
In contrast, NLRB elections balance the rights of both employers and unions and ensure that workers have the chance to hear both sides and reflect on their decision before voting. Contrary to union rhetoric, most companies obey the law during organizing elections, and the NLRB promptly remedies illegal discrimination against workers who want to organize.
Even if this were not the case, however, publicly revealing workers' voting preferences would not remedy any of the abuses that unions allege. Unsurprisingly, most workers say that the current election system is fair and oppose losing their right to vote. Congress should listen to American workers and decline to abolish the government-supervised organizing election system.
Congress should also protect the right of workers and employers to bargain freely. Binding arbitration means that unaccountable and unknowledgeable government bureaucrats would impose employment contracts on newly organized companies. Workers would not have the option of voting down the contract, and companies would have no recourse if an arbitrator imposed uncompetitive terms that would drive it into bankruptcy. Congress should not let the government impose wage controls throughout the economy.
The Employee Free Choice Act does not do what its sponsors contend that it would do. In reality, it strips workers of their rights and their privacy while exposing them to abuse and intimidation and taking away their ability to bargain with their employers.
In the Senate there are 47 co sponsors, all democrats.
In the House there are 234 co sponsors, all but 5 are democrats.
That sounds very partisan to me.
Here is what this bill is all about.
Does a ballot cast in private or a card signed in public better reveal a worker's true preference about whether to join a union? A private vote is the obvious answer, but organized labor has nonetheless made the misleadingly named Employee Free Choice Act (EFCA, H.R. 800) its highest legislative priority.
Recently, unions have switched the focus of their organizing operations from private balloting to publicly signed cards. These so-called card-check campaigns make it much easier for unions to organize workers, but most companies strongly resist the idea of denying their employees a vote. Unions now want the government to take away workers' right to vote and certify unions after only a card-check campaign. The Employee Free Choice Act would do this and more.
First, it requires the National Labor Relations Board to certify a union after a majority of a firm's workers has signed union cards, putting an end to almost all organizing elections: "if the [National Labor Relations] Board finds that a majority of the employees in a unit appropriate for bargaining has signed valid authorizations...the Board shall not direct an election but shall certify the individual or labor organization."[1]
Second, the EFCA requires companies and newly certified unions to enter binding arbitration if they cannot reach agreement on an initial contract after 90 days of negotiations.[2] Neither companies nor employees could appeal the arbitrator's ruling, and the contract would last for two years.
Third, H.R. 800 would dramatically increase the penalties for unfair labor practices committed by employers, but not unions, during an organizing drive.[3]
Union activists contend that the act would protect workers' freedom to freely choose to join a union. However, workers' best defense against harassment and intimidation by either a union or an employer is a secret-ballot election in which neither knows how any individual worker voted.
To protect American workers, Congress should:
* Protect workers' privacy during organizing drives and guarantee every worker the right to vote in a private-ballot election;
* Ensure that workers hear from both sides during an organizing drive and have time to reflect on their choice so they can make an informed and considered decision; and
* Protect the right of workers and employers to bargain collectively without having government officials unilaterally impose employment contracts on them.
The Employee Free Choice Act would strip workers of their fundamental rights and leave them more vulnerable to pressure than before.
The Case Against Card Check
America's labor laws are grounded in the principle that workers should have the freedom to decide whether to bargain collectively with their employers. The law protects workers from retaliation for deciding to join or to reject a union. A company must recognize a union supported by a majority of its workers and may not recognize a union that lacks majority support.
Under current law, union organizers can request an organizing election once 30 percent of a company's workers sign union authorization cards in a "card check."[4] This constitutes a "showing of interest," and the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) then orders that a secret-ballot election be held. These elections usually take place 39 days after the NLRB receives the cards.[5] Unions win about 60 percent of these certification elections.[6] Once the NLRB certifies the union as the employees' exclusive representative, the employer and the union begin negotiating a collective bargaining agreement. Through a process of mutual give and take, the two sides reach an agreement over wages and working conditions.
A company may choose to recognize a union that the NLRB has not certified if the union's organizers present union cards signed by a majority of the company's workers. Unions find it much easier to sign up workers when workers' choices are made in public. However, as the Supreme Court affirmed in NLRB v. Gissel Packing Co. (1969), publicly signed cards are "inherently unreliable," and a company may always request a private vote to confirm that its employees actually want to unionize. Companies usually insist on giving their workers the privacy of the voting booth and refuse to recognize unions without an election.
Fundamental Right to Vote in Privacy. The misleadingly named Employee Free Choice Act would end this system. The act would require companies to recognize a union without a private election once organizers submit union cards signed by a majority of workers in a company. This effectively replaces private organizing ballots with publicly signed cards.
Abolishing elections deprives workers of a fundamental democratic right. Elections guarantee that all workers can express their views on whether they want to belong to a union. Under card check, however, workers who have not been contacted by union organizers have no say in whether their workplace organizes. If organizers collect cards from a majority of workers, all workers must join the union without a vote.
Equally important, a democratic election with private ballots ensures that all workers can express their desires without fear of social stigma or retribution. With a private ballot, no one else knows how any individual worker voted, and workers can express their intentions without outside pressure. For these reasons, the government protects the right of all Americans to vote for elected officials in private. American workers have the same right, and it should not be taken away because it impedes union organizing.
No Elections. Supporters of H.R. 800 contend that it would not prohibit private balloting but would simply give workers the option to choose whether to engage in a private vote or a card check.[7] This argument is very misleading. Under the EFCA, workers could not choose between different organizing methods. The legislation requires the NLRB to certify a union without holding an election once organizers submit cards signed by a majority of workers. Those workers would never have the option to sign a card calling for an election that does not also count toward a card-check majority.
Under current law, an election occurs when union organizers hand in union cards signed by at least 30 percent of a company's workers. If they handed in cards from less than 50 percent of the workers, this would fall short of the EFCA's majority requirement and so would lead to a traditional private election. However, the choice of organizing method would belong solely to union organizers, not workers.
An election would occur only when union organizers submit cards signed by a minority of workers; but union organizers rarely call for an election without signed cards from a majority of workers, because they know that unions usually lose these elections. The AFL-CIO's internal studies show that unions win only 8 percent of elections that are called after less than 40 percent of workers have signed cards.[8] With guaranteed certification under card check, organizers would almost never call for an election once they have obtained enough signatures. Workers would lose their right to a private vote as soon as union organizers collected cards from a majority of employees.
Threats and Intimidation. A private vote is more than a fundamental democratic right; it also protects workers and ensures that they can express their true views. An election ensures that workers can hear both sides, have time for reflection, and then vote their conscience without pressure or fear of retaliation. These safeguards disappear when workers must organize by publicly signing a card. Card checks fail to gauge accurately workers' desire to join a union.
Private ballots ensure that workers' decisions about whether to join a union remain private so that no one can threaten workers for making the "wrong" choice. With card checks, both the company and the union know how workers voted, and this exposes workers to the possibility of retaliation. Though threats are illegal, they still occur, and not all of them are made by employers.
A union has a direct financial stake in the outcome of an organizing drive. If the workers organize, the union will collect 1 percent to 2 percent of their wages in dues. These high stakes lead some organizers to cross the line and threaten workers who refuse to sign union cards. Two examples illustrate this problem.
* In one card-check campaign investigated by the NLRB, a pro-union employee threatened a co-worker by saying that if she refused to sign the union card, "the union would come and get her children and that it would also slash her tires."[9]
* In another case, Thomas Built Buses agreed to recognize a United Auto Workers (UAW) card-check drive in exchange for significant advance wage concessions from the union. Employee Jeff Ward successfully challenged the sweetheart deal before the NLRB and forced the company to allow its workers to vote.[10] In response, the UAW posted flyers around the plant with Mr. Ward's home address, home phone number, and a map to his house. The flyers stated, "Jeff Ward lives here. Go tell him how you really feel about the union."[11]
Forcing workers to express their beliefs in public leaves them vulnerable to threats like these and makes card checks much less reliable than private ballots for revealing employees' true wishes.
Sales Pitch. Even when union organizers do not threaten workers, card checks often do not reveal workers' free and considered choice about joining a union because workers do not hear both sides' pitches and lack time for reflection. Instead, card checks force workers to choose in a high-pressure sales situation.
In a card-check campaign, groups of organizers meet with individual workers at their homes or elsewhere and press them to sign a union authorization card. Organizers do not simply present the arguments for and against joining the union and then ask for a worker's support. Instead, they employ psychological manipulation to induce workers to sign after hearing their pitch. One former union organizer described the process in congressional testimony:
[Organizers] are trained to perform a five-part house call strategy that includes: Introductions, Listening, Agitation, Union Solution, and Commitment. The goal of the organizer is to quickly establish a trust relationship with the worker, move from talking about what their job entails to what they would like to change about their job, agitate them by insisting that management won't fix their workplace problems without a union and finally convincing the worker to sign a card....
Typically, if a worker signed a card, it had nothing to do with whether a worker was satisfied with the job or felt they were treated fairly by his or her boss.... [I]f someone told me that she was perfectly contented at work, enjoyed her job and liked her boss, I would look around her house and ask questions based on what I noticed: "wow, I bet on your salary, you'll never be able to get your house remodeled," or, "so does the company pay for day care?" These were questions to which I knew the answer and could use to make her feel that she was cheated by her boss. Five minutes earlier she had just told me that she was feeling good about her work situation.[12]
Signing a card after this kind of manipulation does not reflect an employee's unfettered and considered choice.
Only One Side of the Story. Organizers have a job to do: recruit new dues-paying members to their union. They are not paid to inform workers of the downsides of unionizing. Instead, they make the strongest case they can for joining a union and ask workers to sign their card right then. A former union organizer explained the process:
We rarely showed workers what an actual union contract looked like because we knew that it wouldn't necessarily reflect what a worker would want to see. We were trained to avoid topics such as dues increases, strike histories, etc. and to constantly move the worker back to what the organizer identified as his or her "issues" during the first part of the house call.[13]
Union organizers understandably boast about the benefits unions bring members, but they do not bring up the six-figure salaries that union bosses pay themselves from members' dues, the fact that hundreds of union officials have been convicted of racketeering in the past five years, or the role that unions' inflexibility has played in driving some companies into bankruptcy. Instead, union organizers make their pitch and ask workers to sign their cards immediately. By making card-check organizing the norm, the Employee Free Choice Act would prevent workers from making informed decisions.
Harassing Holdouts. With card checks, union organizers know who has and has not signed up to join the union, allowing them to repeatedly approach and pressure reluctant workers who declined to sign after the first sales pitch. With this technique, a worker's decision to join the union is binding, while a decision to opt out only means "not this time."
Moreover, some organizers go beyond pressure to outright harassment. Hotel workers in Los Angeles, for example, had to seek an injunction against union organizers after groups of eight to ten organizers harassed employees on their homes' porches late at night.[14] A labor lawyer explained what happened to Trico Marine employees during a card-check drive:
Some employees, when solicited at their homes by union representatives, said, "No," to signing a card; yet, they reported repeated, frequent home visits by union representatives continuing to try to secure their signatures, and they complained to the company of this harassment. After 8 visits, one vessel officer in southern Louisiana had an arrest warrant issued against a union organizer.... Employees volunteered that they signed cards just to stop the pressure and harassment.[15]
A card signed after union organizers' eighth pitch to a reluctant worker hardly reflects that worker's true opinion; nor does a card that is signed just to prevent further harassment.
Organizing Without Majority Support. Card-check campaigns expose workers to union threats and harassment and pressure them to commit after hearing a one-sided union sales pitch. Cards collected under those circumstances often do not reflect employees' free choice. Consequently card-check allows union activists to organize plants where a majority of workers oppose the union.
For example, Metaldyne Corporation agreed to allow the UAW to organize its workers with a card-check campaign in exchange for concessions at the bargaining table. The UAW soon collected union cards from a majority of workers, and Metaldyne agreed to recognize the UAW as its employees' representative. Soon afterwards, a majority of the company's workers submitted a signed petition stating that they did not want a union and requesting that the NLRB decertify their union.[16] The signed union cards did not reflect the employees' true preferences.
Unions Know Card Checks Are Unreliable. Despite their public arguments in favor of the EFCA and card checks, union organizers candidly admit in private that card checks do not reflect workers' true beliefs. Union organizing manuals have long cautioned organizers that a worker's signature on a union card does not mean that he or she wants to join a union or will vote for the union in the election. The AFL-CIO's 1961 Guidebook for Union Organizers states:
NLRB pledge cards are at best a signifying of interest at a given moment. Sometimes they are signed to "get the union off my back"... Whatever the reason, there is no guarantee of anything in a signed NLRB pledge card except that it will count towards an NLRB election.[17]
Union organizers also acknowledge that a card-check campaign allows them to organize workplaces without workers' majority support. United Food and Commercial Workers organizer Joe Crump openly admits that with card check, "You don't need a majority or even 30% support among employees."[18] Crump instructs organizers not to worry that aggressive campaigning for a company to skip an election might turn workers against the union, because "if you had massive employee support, you probably would be conducting a traditional organizing [election] campaign."[19]
Metaldyne was not an unusual case. Unions regularly submit publicly signed authorization cards from a large majority of a company's workers only to see the workers reject the union in the privacy of the voting booth. In a study of organizing campaigns, the AFL-CIO admitted that "it is not until the union obtains signatures from 75% or more of the unit that the union has more than a 50% likelihood of winning the election."[20]
Unions Allege Abuses and Imbalances. It is difficult to argue for stripping workers of their right to a private vote. To justify putting an end to organizing elections, unions argue that the elections take place "in an inherently and intensely coercive environment" and are stacked against workers who want to join a union.[21]
Unions allege that companies systematically fire pro-union workers, threaten to shut down if their workers unionize, and use stalling tactics to delay holding votes. At the same time, say the activists, companies bombard their workers with anti-union messages at work while union organizers do not have access to workers to make their case. They also claim that it takes so long for the NLRB to investigate violations that employers routinely ignore laws protecting workers.[22] In the words of one labor activist, government-supervised secret-ballot organizing elections "look more like the discredited practices of rogue regimes abroad than like anything we would call American."[23]
If such abuses were occurring, depriving workers of a private vote would do almost nothing to stop them. However, the unions' allegations are either factually false or highly misleading. The facts show that employers rarely violate the law in organizing drives and that, if anything, NLRB election procedures favor unions: Unions win 61 percent of all organizing elections.[24]
Illegal Firings Rare. Union activists argue that Congress should replace organizing elections with card checks because employers regularly fire union supporters during organizing election campaigns in order to intimidate the remaining workers.[25] They claim that this happens in one-quarter of organizing campaigns and that there were "31,358 cases in 2005 of illegal firings and other discrimination against workers for exercising their federally protected labor law rights."[26]
If union activists' claims are correct, card checks would actually make it easier for companies to fire union supporters. Companies currently do not know how individual workers plan to vote in the privacy of the voting booth, but a union card signed in public is an entirely different matter. If the practice of systematically firing workers who want to unionize is widespread, then the government should not strip those workers of their privacy by informing employers of exactly who has elected to unionize.
In fact, however, the activists' claims are false. Illegal firings of union supporters are rare. Most unfair labor practice complaints that unions brought before the NLRB in 2005 were either withdrawn or dismissed.[27] The NLRB found substantiated evidence of illegal firings in just 2.7 percent of organizing election campaigns that took place that year.[28]
Misleading Numbers. Unions justify their claims of widespread illegal firings by using unreliable data from biased sources and by misrepresenting government statistics. Their claim that companies fire workers in one-quarter of organizing drives, for example, comes from a survey of union organizers that was conducted by a former union organizer.[29] Union organizers are not an impartial source, and actual government investigations reveal little evidence of the employer misconduct they allege.
Even more misleading is the claim that "illegal firings and other discrimination against workers" occurred 31,358 times in 2005. The number comes from the 2005 annual report of the National Labor Relations Board.[30] The report shows that the NLRB ordered employers to pay that many workers back pay in 2005, but the NLRB awards back pay to resolve many types of disputes, only a few of which involve intimidation or organizing campaigns.
For example, if a company unilaterally changed working conditions by reducing hours to cut costs without first negotiating with the union, the NLRB would order the company to return to the status quo and bargain the changes with the union. The NLRB could also require the company to provide back pay to workers as though the changes never occurred by paying them for the hours that they would have worked had the company not reduced working hours. Asserting that all or even most awards of back pay are due to intimidation, fraud, or illegal firings during organizing campaigns is simply false.
If a company illegally fires a worker for supporting a union during an election campaign, the NLRB will order it to reinstate that worker in addition to providing back pay. While the numbers of workers reinstated and awarded back pay would be the same if these remedies were due to illegal firings, government records show that reinstatement is far less common than back pay. The NLRB ordered just 2,008 workers reinstated in 2005, a number that includes workers who were illegally fired for other causes, such as discussing salary with their co-workers.[31] Union activists' claim that employers fired or discriminated against more than 31,000 employees for trying to organize in 2005 reflects either a complete misunderstanding or misrepresentation of what the NLRB's data really represent.
No Cure for Illegal Threats. Labor activists claim that employers regularly attempt to intimidate workers by threatening to shut down or move plants if workers unionize and argue that card checks could curtail this intimidation.[32] Union organizers say that employers make such threats in half of all organizing campaigns, although they rarely follow through.[33] But such threats are already illegal and are grounds for setting aside an election.
Card checks would also do nothing to prevent companies from making these threats. Abolishing private elections does not address the problem of employers making empty threats to their workers. Companies can deliver illegal threats just as effectively whether employees vote in private or sign up for a union in public. Union activists acknowledge this fact.[34]
Timely Investigation. Union activists agree that workers' legal protections look good on paper, but they claim that it takes so long for the government to investigate violations that these protections are meaningless in practice.[35] The AFL-CIO argues that "in 50 percent of the decisions issued by the NLRB in 2002 in unfair labor practice charge cases, workers waited more than 889 days for the NLRB to reach a decision."[36]
This claim is highly misleading. The National Labor Relations Board is labor law's equivalent of the U.S. Supreme Court. Only 3 percent of labor cases make it to the NLRB, and many of those embody novel legal issues, not the routine enforcement of the law.[37] Most cases are either settled by the parties or handled by lower levels of the NLRB bureaucracy.
It takes an NLRB regional director a median of only 95 days, or three months, to investigate an unfair labor practice charge, determine whether it has merit, and file a formal "complaint."[38] Only 13 percent of all cases reach that stage.[39] Fully 87 percent are closed before the complaint stage, either dismissed for lack of merit or resolved by settlements in which the company makes restitution. Cases that are not dismissed or settled take a median of three months from the filing of the complaint to the administrative law judge's decision. Only 5 percent of cases, overall, reach that stage.[40]
Ninety-five percent of all alleged violations of worker rights are settled through procedures that typically take between three to six months. That is no reason to take away workers' right to a private vote.
Delays Rare. Unions also allege that, in addition to illegally threatening and firing workers, employers use legal maneuvers to delay holding organizing elections. They claim that companies file baseless objections with the NLRB in order to drag out election campaigns for months. This, they say, gives employers more time to intimidate their employees and causes workers to lose confidence in the union.[41] Labor activists argue that to prevent interminable delays before a vote, the government should replace private ballots with public union cards that would not be subject to delays.
The unions' claims, however, are simply false. The typical organizing election takes place 39 days after union organizers file an election petition. Over 94 percent of organizing elections take place within eight weeks after organizers have filed a petition.[42] Eight weeks is not an unreasonable delay for a decision that demands consideration by workers and that could affect them for years. Congress should not strip workers of their right to a private vote because labor activists think eight weeks is too long to wait for an organizing election.
Rights of Unions and Employers Balanced by Law. Unions claim that employers have an unfair advantage during organizing election campaigns. They argue that the system makes it too difficult for workers to organize, even when employers follow the law, because unions and employers do not have equal access to workers. They point out that management can campaign against unionizing all day long during working hours, while unions may do so only during break times. They say that employees cannot freely choose union membership when they do not get to hear the union case and that card checks would fix this problem.[43]
This argument is also misleading. The law balances the rights of unions and employers during organizing elections to ensure that workers can hear from both sides. Generally, union organizers may not campaign when workers are on company time, but organizers may speak during unpaid time at work, such as breaks, unless the company has a policy prohibiting all solicitation--not just solicitation by unions--on its premises.
In addition, the government requires companies to provide union organizers with a complete and accurate list of all employees' names and addresses within seven days of the NLRB's order to conduct an election. If the company refuses, the NLRB will set aside the election and order a re-vote.[44] Union organizers are free to contact employees at home or by phone to make their case, but employers may not do so.[45] The law guarantees unions the opportunity to make their case to employees--just not when companies pay those employees to work.
The Employee Free Choice Act would in reality make it more difficult for unions to contact workers to make their case. Employees would still spend an average of 40 hours a week at their place of work with or without an election. If organizers did not file for an election, however, employers would have no obligation to provide them with the list of employee names and addresses. Without that list, organizers would have less access to workers to argue in favor of joining a union. If employers truly have unfair access to employees and unions do not have the opportunity to make their case, card check proposals that would make it harder for union organizers to meet with workers are not the solution.
Card Check Would Not Counter Alleged Abuses. Unions also object to the fact that employers can campaign against organizing and present workers with arguments against joining a union at the workplace. AFL-CIO president John Sweeney complains that employers require "supervisors to shovel anti-union propaganda to the employees whose schedules, evaluations and advancement they control" and force "workers to attend one-sided, anti-union meetings where management can legally fire pro-union workers who speak out."[46] Unions say that card checks would remedy this problem.
If employers' campaigns against unionizing were a serious problem, card-check laws that force workers to reveal their preferences in public would not solve it. The First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution guarantees employers the right to present their views to their workers. So long as they avoid threats, employers would still be able to hold "captive audience" meetings and "shovel anti-union propaganda" to their workers just as effectively when ballots are public as they could when they are private.
However, employer campaigns against unionizing benefit workers by informing them of the downsides of joining a union. Supervisors, for example, often hold group meetings where they inform workers of the potential costs of union membership. This may be the only time that workers hear why they might not want to join. Union organizers will not tell workers these things. Unions train organizers to avoid topics like dues increases and strike histories that could persuade workers to reject the union.[47] Employers should provide their workers with the other side of the story. That is how democracy works: Voters make an informed decision in private after both sides make their strongest case.
Few Workers Want to Organize. Union activists contend that the low level of unionization in the United States proves that elections do not reflect workers' free choice. They argue that most American workers actually want to join a union. They back this up with polling numbers showing that 53 percent of non-union workers, or 57 million workers, would like to belong to a union.[48]
However those numbers are highly suspect. The AFL-CIO commissioned the poll. Peter Hart, a Democratic pollster, conducted it. The poll itself remains unpublished, and the AFL-CIO has not revealed the questions or polling methodologies used.
Publicly publishedpolls conducted by nonpartisan pollsters show the opposite: Relatively few non-union workers want general representation. Zogby polling shows that, by a margin of more than 3 to 1, non-union workers do not want to belong to a labor union.[49] Because a union must win the support of a majority of a company's workers to win recognition, the fact that relatively few workers belong to a union is not surprising.
Workers Disagree with Union Claims. Labor activists claim to speak for American workers, but workers disagree with the claims unions make on their behalf. Contrary to union claims of widespread corporate intimidation, Zogby polling shows that 71 percent of union members believe that the current private-ballot process is fair, versus only 13 percent who disagree. Nor do union members want to lose their right to a private vote. Fully 78 percent of union members favor keeping the current system over replacing it with one that provides less privacy.[50]
The vast majority of Americans side with union members and not union bosses, believing that workers should have the choice to keep their views on organizing private. Fully 89 percent of Americans believe that a worker's ultimate choice should be kept private.[51]
XREFIn addition, a large majority of workers also oppose any effort to replace organizing elections with publicly signed cards. A recent McLaughlin poll indicates that 79 percent of Americans oppose card-check legislation that would end private-ballot elections.[52] About 66 percent of union members agree and think that companies should never be allowed to skip private-ballot elections before they recognize a union.[53] The very employees that union activists claim to represent oppose replacing private-ballot elections with card checks.
The Real Goal: Improving Union Finances. Unions know that private ballots best reveal workers' desires and that card-check organizing would not address, and could exacerbate, the alleged shortcomings of private elections. Yet they still favor card checks over private ballots. This is because their real aim is to reverse the labor movement's long-term decline. Unions are harder to sell to workers today than they were in the manufacturing economy of two generations ago. Today's jobs require unique skills and talents that do not lend themselves to general representation. Most workers in the modern economy do not feel that union membership provides benefits worth the 1 percent to 2 percent of their salary that they would have to pay in dues.
Consequently, union membership has fallen steadily since the 1950s, and unions lost another 326,000 members in 2006. Today, just 12 percent of workers belong to unions--less than at any point since Franklin D. Roosevelt's Administration.[54] Fewer members translates into less dues money and increased financial hardship for organized labor.
Unions seek to reverse that trend, and they know that card check allows them to organize workplaces without workers' majority support. Unions want the Employee Free Choice Act because it would make it easier to recruit dues-paying members, not because it would somehow defend workers' right to choose freely to unionize.
Congress Should Protect Private Ballots. A worker's best protection from pressure when deciding to join a union is the privacy of the voting booth. Card-check campaigns expose workers to potential intimidation. Even when organizers obey the law, they give workers one-sided sales pitches and press them to commit to the union immediately, without time for reflection or the opportunity to hear both sides.
Workers deserve better. To protect workers' rights and ensure that they can make informed and considered decisions, Congress should prohibit card-check organizing. Congress should stop companies from waiving their employees' right to vote by requiring a private-ballot election before a union is certified as the workers' exclusive representative.
The Case Against Binding Arbitration
The Employee Free Choice Act also provides for the use of binding arbitration to resolve bargaining impasses. Currently, negotiations on an initial contract following unionization are treated much the same as any other contract: The parties negotiate in good faith until they settle on terms. If they fail to do so, the union may call a strike, and the employer may implement its last offer or even lock out workers.
In a section misleadingly titled "Facilitating Initial Collective Bargaining Agreements," the EFCA provides that after 90 days of bargaining on an initial union contract, either party may request mediation by the Federal Mediation and Conciliation Service (FMCS). Thirty days later, if the parties are still unable to settle on a contract or agree to extend negotiations, the FMCS:
shall refer the dispute to an arbitration board established in accordance with such regulations as may be prescribed by the Service. The arbitration panel shall render a decision settling the dispute and such decision shall be binding upon the parties for a period of two years, unless amended during such period by written consent of the parties.[55]
Arbitration can be a valuable method for resolving disputes and is frequently used in labor relations. Both management and labor have found it useful to bring in a trusted third party to evaluate grievances that might arise under an existing contract, a process that allows them to avoid the costs and delays of litigation. In this sense, arbitration is a valuable alternative to the court system.
Given the disruption and even violence that can accompany strikes, it may seem attractive to avoid them by having a neutral third party step in and determine the wages and other terms of employment when unions and employers fail to reach an agreement. This process is referred to as "binding arbitration," and many states use it to resolve bargaining impasses involving public employees who are not allowed to go on strike.
But unlike other situations in which arbitration works well, in binding arbitration, the arbitrator does not simply take the place of a judge in a courtroom. Instead of applying the law or the terms of an existing agreement to settle a dispute, the arbitrator has the task of figuring out what a fair agreement should look like. This is a much more difficult and risky process and one that unions and management seldom agree to on their own.[56]
While the EFCA purports to "facilitat[e] Initial Collective Bargaining Agreements," it does the opposite, leaving both parties subject to the decisions of an arbitration panel that one side or both sides may not want rather than encouraging them to arrive at a mutually satisfactory contract. In place of an agreement, the EFCA would impose the educated guess of a government-appointed arbitrator, leaving management and workers to deal with the consequences.
Binding Arbitration's Bad Record. The EFCA says little about the specific process of binding arbitration, leaving it to the FMCS to determine how an arbitration panel will be chosen, what sort of evidence it will consider and when, and what process it will use to make a decision. The state of Michigan uses binding arbitration to resolve bargaining impasses involving public safety workers, such as police officers, firefighters, and emergency medical technicians employed by county and municipal governments. The process in Michigan is fairly typical, and the experience of this state is a reasonable guide to the risks involved in binding arbitration.
When negotiations break down to the point that binding arbitration is needed, Michigan law calls for a three-member panel to determine wages and other terms of employment. The government employer and union each appoint a panelist, while the third, a neutral arbitrator who serves as chairman, is chosen from a list provided by the state.[57] Because the members appointed by the union and the employer can be counted on to support their own sides, the binding arbitration process ultimately hinges on the opinions of this neutral member.
Under the Michigan statute, binding arbitration is supposed to go quickly. Assembling the arbitration panel should take less than three weeks. Once the panel is named, the first hearing should be held within 15 days, and hearings are supposed to be wrapped up 30 days after they commence.[58]
In reality, the process takes much longer. In the early 1990s, only one out of every six binding arbitration cases was resolved within 300 days of a petition's being filed. The pace of arbitration has improved since then, but not by much.[59] A review of 29 binding arbitration cases resolved in 2005 and 2006 showed that only seven--fewer than one out of four--were resolved within 300 days. On average, binding arbitration takes almost 15 months from the date that a request is filed to the date that a decision is reached.[60]
Unaccountable Arbitrators. The Employee Free Choice Act would put control of wages and working conditions in the hands of unaccountable government officials. Arbitrators do not have to live with the consequences of their decisions. Michigan law lists a number of criteria that the panel is to consider in making a decision, such as the ability of the government employer to pay, comparisons with similar communities, trends in private-sector employment, and the local cost of living. Nonetheless, in the end, the process is very arbitrary; there is no step-by-step analysis that an arbitrator should go through. Arbitrators decide what weights to put on these factors with virtually no risk that their rulings will be overturned by the courts.
An ill-conceived arbitrator's award can have severe consequences for both communities and employees. For instance, an arbitrator's 1978 decision to award Detroit police a cost-of-living allowance--an expensive item given the high inflation of the late 1970s--threw a precarious city budget out of balance. After the state courts refused to overturn the award, the city was forced to lay off 20 percent of its police force. Crime rates, which had been declining, increased dramatically. Even those officers who kept their jobs paid a price; in 1981, the city and the police union agreed to a wage freeze.[61]
Unlike a local government, a business cannot raise taxes or turn to a higher level of government for financial assistance if an arbitrator's decision goes against it. Competition in the free market means that if an arbitrator miscalculates and raises wages too high, a company cannot raise its prices to compensate for the decision without the risk of losing customers. An ill-advised arbitrator's ruling can easily lead to financial difficulty and layoffs. Yet arbitrators face no penalty if a miscalculation sends a company into bankruptcy or cheats workers out of a wage increase they would have earned. Unlike binding arbitration, with collective bargaining, both sides have a stake in making the final agreement work.
Stifling Competitiveness and Innovation. As damaging as an ill-advised arbitrator's decision might be for a local government, binding arbitration does even greater damage in the private sector by stifling competitiveness and innovation.
Unlike the typical arbitrator's decision in government, the EFCA would apply only to the initial negotiations after a union is recognized. This means that the arbitrator would not be able to look to prior collective bargaining agreements for guidance.
Without prior agreements to use as a baseline, a conscientious arbitrator will be more likely to base his or her decision on the practices of comparable companies, but this has drawbacks too. A company with its own distinctive business model could be forced to adopt the practices of its competitors, forcing it to give up its unique approach to its business and give up its competitive advantages.
If the binding arbitration process turns out to be a slow one, as it often is in Michigan government, business owners will be forced to prepare for retroactive back-pay awards while they wait for overdue decisions. This ties up funds that cannot be used to invest in new equipment, and these funds cannot be offered as incentives to lure new workers because back-pay awards go exclusively to the existing workforce.
Extreme Demands. Binding arbitration can affect the entire bargaining process. It is a common practice for both employers and unions in Michigan to make extreme proposals during bargaining with an eye toward the possibility of arbitration. The arbitrator may know little about how a specific corporation stays competitive and may not have the experience necessary to discern which demands are so extreme that they would not be agreed to in collective bargaining.
This complicates collective bargaining, as negotiators must agree to set aside these demands before they can get to negotiating on more realistic provisions. If negotiations break down and an arbitrator is brought in, the arbitrator might not be able to see through the posturing and could include these demands as part of his or her decision. The arbitrator could force companies to:
* Participate in multi-employer union pension plans, many of which are now underfunded;
* Guarantee no layoffs irrespective of worker productivity; and
* Adopt uncompetitive work rules and production quotas.
These policies would cripple the competitiveness of American firms. In addition, binding arbitration is not without drawbacks for workers. Because of the way that binding arbitration fits in the overall scheme of the National Labor Relations Act, the arbitration process is likely to make unions less accountable to those whom it is supposed to represent and protect.
Stuck with an Unwanted Union. Binding arbitration could leave workers stuck with a union that they do not want, such as one that failed them by not accepting a better offer from management when it had the chance or by putting on a poor presentation in front of the arbitration panel. Workers would then be stuck paying union dues out of their disappointing wages.
The National Labor Relations Act (NLRA) does provide for the removal of a union that has lost worker support. The process is similar to that used to bring a union in today. When opponents collect signatures from 30 percent of their co-workers, they can petition for a decertification vote. The same rules apply if workers want to bring in a different union. Employees who have a problem with the union cannot just go out and start collecting signatures, however. They must wait until the law presents them with an opening. The EFCA and decisions of the NLRB have created several "bars" to decertification.
First, there is the certification bar. After a union is recognized, workers must wait a full year before they have an opportunity to vote to remove the union or bring in another one. During this time, the union has its opportunity to negotiate its first contract. Then comes the contract bar. Once a collective bargaining agreement is reached, a decertification election may not be held while that contract is in place, for up to three years.[62] There is no provision in the EFCA that would prevent the NLRB from treating an arbitrator's ruling as a contract and barring decertification petitions while one is in effect.
Workers Lose All Say. Still, the current law does allow workers to remove a union if negotiations drag on too long, and depending on the rules of the union, workers can vote down a contract if they are not satisfied with its terms. Workers also have the right to honor a strike or to refrain from striking, as they think best, if the union calls for its members to cease working. All of these rights serve to give workers some degree of autonomy and some control over the union and in the workplace.
With binding arbitration in place, however, these rights are likely to be gone or rendered moot. The EFCA does not provide for workers to terminate the binding arbitration process. No matter how long arbitration drags on, the workers will remain stuck with it. Once an arbitrator is called in, his or her word will be final, so a vote to reject the contract is out of the question. With a mediator-imposed contract, workers would lose all say in the workplace. They could not even ask their supervisors for a raise for good performance beyond what the contract allowed. And in states that do not have right-to-work protections, the arbitrator's ruling is almost guaranteed to have a forced-dues provision, because forced dues are relatively common in collective bargaining agreements, and arbitrators are likely to follow this widespread precedent.
Since the EFCA also makes card-check certification mandatory, it would create a system in which union officials can finagle or bully approval from workers who do not really want them there, and those workers would be obliged to wait several years, and pay union dues for two years, before having any chance to get rid of the unwanted union. Such a state of affairs would make a mockery of one of the basic premises of American labor law: The will of the majority of workers should determine whether or not a union will represent them.
The Case Against Differential Treatment
The third and final component of the Employee Free Choice Act has received the least attention. Section 4 dramatically increases the penalties against employers for unfair labor practices conducted during an organizing drive and requires the NLRB to prioritize investigation of those cases.
Currently, when an employer illegally discriminates against a worker for supporting a union during an organizing campaign, the law requires the employer to provide that worker full back pay. The EFCA would require the employer to provide triple back pay and would add a civil penalty of up to $20,000 for most unfair labor practices committed by employers during organizing drives. It would also require the NLRB to give preliminary investigation of those unfair labor practices "priority over all other cases." The EFCA would not, however, increase penalties for unfair labor practices committed by unions against either workers or businesses.
Misrepresenting the Problem of Union Coercion. Union supporters contend that this differential treatment is justified because unions almost never intimidate or coerce workers during organizing campaigns. Nancy Schiffer, AFL-CIO Associate General Counsel, presents the unions' case:
Is coercion in the signing of authorizations a legitimate concern? A recent review of 113 cases cited by the HR Policy Association as "involving" fraud and coercion identified only 42 decisions since the Act's inception that actually found coercion, fraud or misrepresentation in the signing of union authorization forms. That's less than one case per year.[63]
This misrepresents the HR Policy Association's findings to paint a completely false picture of union coercion. In a policy brief on the EFCA, the association included a list of 113 NLRB decisions involving "union deception and/or coercion in obtaining authorization card signatures."[64] Union activists examined those cases closely and found that only 42 of those 113 NLRB cases directly concerned those issues, but that does not mean that there have been only 42 cases of union coercion over the past 60 years. It means only that the National Labor Relations Board has decided 42 cases concerning forgery or intimidation in the obtaining of union cards during that time. These are two different things.
As described above, the NLRB is labor law's equivalent of the Supreme Court and hears only a small proportion of labor cases. The union argument makes as much sense as examining 60 years of Supreme Court rulings, finding 42 that involved arson, and then claiming that there had been only 42 cases of arson in the United States during that time.
Union Coercion a Real Problem. In fact, union coercion and intimidation are not as rare as labor activists contend. Thousands of unfair labor practices cases have been filed against unions since 2000, including 1,417 for coercive statements, 416 for violence and assaults, 546 for harassment, and 1,325 for threatening statements.[65] Many of these cases did not involve election campaigns, and the unions were not found guilty in every case, but these numbers show that workers have a real problem with union intimidation.
Workers have a right to decide whether to join a union without being subjected to coercion or pressure. Threats and intimidation from either employers or unions are equally repugnant. By increasing penalties against only employers, the EFCA sends the message that union threats are less of an injustice than employer threats. Prioritizing cases of employer discrimination forces workers who face union intimidation to wait longer for justice.
The law should not make this distinction. A worker assaulted by union members for refusing to sign a union card has been subjected to no less an injustice done than has a worker fired by his employer for signing a union card. If Congress believes stiffer labor law penalties are needed, those higher penalties should apply equally to employers and to unions. Cases of union violence and employer intimidation should also have equal priority.
Conclusion
The Employee Free Choice Act would strip American workers of their right to a private-ballot vote, require companies to submit to binding arbitration, and increase penalties for unfair labor practices committed by employers but not by unions. Each of these provisions would be bad for American workers.
Congress should instead protect the privacy of American workers and guarantee their right to vote in an election before joining a union. Congress should also guarantee every worker the opportunity to hear arguments from both sides and time to reflect before voting.
Replacing organizing elections with public card checks is a move in the wrong direction. Card checks expose workers to threats and intimidation from unions and employers. Even when organizers obey the law, card checks still leave workers vulnerable to peer pressure and harassment. Organizers know who has and has not signed, so they repeatedly return to pressure holdouts to change their minds. They give workers a high-pressure sales pitch that only presents the union side and press them to commit immediately without time for reflection. Cards signed under these circumstances do not accurately reflect an employee's true intentions--a fact that unions privately acknowledge.
In contrast, NLRB elections balance the rights of both employers and unions and ensure that workers have the chance to hear both sides and reflect on their decision before voting. Contrary to union rhetoric, most companies obey the law during organizing elections, and the NLRB promptly remedies illegal discrimination against workers who want to organize.
Even if this were not the case, however, publicly revealing workers' voting preferences would not remedy any of the abuses that unions allege. Unsurprisingly, most workers say that the current election system is fair and oppose losing their right to vote. Congress should listen to American workers and decline to abolish the government-supervised organizing election system.
Congress should also protect the right of workers and employers to bargain freely. Binding arbitration means that unaccountable and unknowledgeable government bureaucrats would impose employment contracts on newly organized companies. Workers would not have the option of voting down the contract, and companies would have no recourse if an arbitrator imposed uncompetitive terms that would drive it into bankruptcy. Congress should not let the government impose wage controls throughout the economy.
The Employee Free Choice Act does not do what its sponsors contend that it would do. In reality, it strips workers of their rights and their privacy while exposing them to abuse and intimidation and taking away their ability to bargain with their employers.
76% of Americans in a recent poll think we should drill for our own oil, here is what the speaker of the house thinks.
She won't even let it come up for a vote because there are a lot of Dems that would vote for it.
Lying again
Here is Obama on the surge, before it started.
Now yesterday he said that of course we new the surge was going to make a big difference.
Now yesterday he said that of course we new the surge was going to make a big difference.
Here is an article from the London Times today
Here is what a lot of people think about Obama and it scares us.
He ventured forth to bring light to the world
The anointed one's pilgrimage to the Holy Land is a miracle in action - and a blessing to all his faithful followers
Gerard Baker
And it came to pass, in the eighth year of the reign of the evil Bush the Younger (The Ignorant), when the whole land from the Arabian desert to the shores of the Great Lakes had been laid barren, that a Child appeared in the wilderness.
The Child was blessed in looks and intellect. Scion of a simple family, offspring of a miraculous union, grandson of a typical white person and an African peasant. And yea, as he grew, the Child walked in the path of righteousness, with only the occasional detour into the odd weed and a little blow.
When he was twelve years old, they found him in the temple in the City of Chicago, arguing the finer points of community organisation with the Prophet Jeremiah and the Elders. And the Elders were astonished at what they heard and said among themselves: “Verily, who is this Child that he opens our hearts and minds to the audacity of hope?”
In the great Battles of Caucus and Primary he smote the conniving Hillary, wife of the deposed King Bill the Priapic and their barbarian hordes of Working Class Whites.
Background
* Obama fears the Blair effect as tour continues
* The Europhiles are not the future, Mr Obama
* The Bugle - Barack Obama is coming to Europe!
* Our leaders go after some Obama magic
And so it was, in the fullness of time, before the harvest month of the appointed year, the Child ventured forth - for the first time - to bring the light unto all the world.
He travelled fleet of foot and light of camel, with a small retinue that consisted only of his loyal disciples from the tribe of the Media. He ventured first to the land of the Hindu Kush, where the
Taleban had harboured the viper of al-Qaeda in their bosom, raining terror on all the world.
And the Child spake and the tribes of Nato immediately loosed the Caveats that had previously bound them. And in the great battle that ensued the forces of the light were triumphant. For as long as the Child stood with his arms raised aloft, the enemy suffered great blows and the threat of terror was no more.
From there he went forth to Mesopotamia where he was received by the great ruler al-Maliki, and al-Maliki spake unto him and blessed his Sixteen Month Troop Withdrawal Plan even as the imperial warrior Petraeus tried to destroy it.
And lo, in Mesopotamia, a miracle occurred. Even though the Great Surge of Armour that the evil Bush had ordered had been a terrible mistake, a waste of vital military resources and doomed to end in disaster, the Child's very presence suddenly brought forth a great victory for the forces of the light.
And the Persians, who saw all this and were greatly fearful, longed to speak with the Child and saw that the Child was the bringer of peace. At the mention of his name they quickly laid aside their intrigues and beat their uranium swords into civil nuclear energy ploughshares.
From there the Child went up to the city of Jerusalem, and entered through the gate seated on an ass. The crowds of network anchors who had followed him from afar cheered “Hosanna” and waved great palm fronds and strewed them at his feet.
In Jerusalem and in surrounding Palestine, the Child spake to the Hebrews and the Arabs, as the Scripture had foretold. And in an instant, the lion lay down with the lamb, and the Israelites and Ishmaelites ended their long enmity and lived for ever after in peace.
As word spread throughout the land about the Child's wondrous works, peoples from all over flocked to hear him; Hittites and Abbasids; Obamacons and McCainiacs; Cameroonians and Blairites.
And they told of strange and wondrous things that greeted the news of the Child's journey. Around the world, global temperatures began to decline, and the ocean levels fell and the great warming was over.
The Great Prophet Algore of Nobel and Oscar, who many had believed was the anointed one, smiled and told his followers that the Child was the one generations had been waiting for.
And there were other wonderful signs. In the city of the Street at the Wall, spreads on interbank interest rates dropped like manna from Heaven and rates on credit default swaps fell to the ground as dead birds from the almond tree, and the people who had lived in foreclosure were able to borrow again.
Black gold gushed from the ground at prices well below $140 per barrel. In hospitals across the land the sick were cured even though they were uninsured. And all because the Child had pronounced it.
And this is the testimony of one who speaks the truth and bears witness to the truth so that you might believe. And he knows it is the truth for he saw it all on CNN and the BBC and in the pages of The New York Times.
Then the Child ventured forth from Israel and Palestine and stepped onto the shores of the Old Continent. In the land of Queen Angela of Merkel, vast multitudes gathered to hear his voice, and he preached to them at length.
But when he had finished speaking his disciples told him the crowd was hungry, for they had had nothing to eat all the hours they had waited for him.
And so the Child told his disciples to fetch some food but all they had was five loaves and a couple of frankfurters. So he took the bread and the frankfurters and blessed them and told his disciples to feed the multitudes. And when all had eaten their fill, the scraps filled twelve baskets.
Thence he travelled west to Mount Sarkozy. Even the beauteous Princess Carla of the tribe of the Bruni was struck by awe and she was great in love with the Child, but he was tempted not.
On the Seventh Day he walked across the Channel of the Angles to the ancient land of the hooligans. There he was welcomed with open arms by the once great prophet Blair and his successor, Gordon the Leper, and his successor, David the Golden One.
And suddenly, with the men appeared the archangel Gabriel and the whole host of the heavenly choir, ranks of cherubim and seraphim, all praising God and singing: “Yes, We Can.”
He ventured forth to bring light to the world
The anointed one's pilgrimage to the Holy Land is a miracle in action - and a blessing to all his faithful followers
Gerard Baker
And it came to pass, in the eighth year of the reign of the evil Bush the Younger (The Ignorant), when the whole land from the Arabian desert to the shores of the Great Lakes had been laid barren, that a Child appeared in the wilderness.
The Child was blessed in looks and intellect. Scion of a simple family, offspring of a miraculous union, grandson of a typical white person and an African peasant. And yea, as he grew, the Child walked in the path of righteousness, with only the occasional detour into the odd weed and a little blow.
When he was twelve years old, they found him in the temple in the City of Chicago, arguing the finer points of community organisation with the Prophet Jeremiah and the Elders. And the Elders were astonished at what they heard and said among themselves: “Verily, who is this Child that he opens our hearts and minds to the audacity of hope?”
In the great Battles of Caucus and Primary he smote the conniving Hillary, wife of the deposed King Bill the Priapic and their barbarian hordes of Working Class Whites.
Background
* Obama fears the Blair effect as tour continues
* The Europhiles are not the future, Mr Obama
* The Bugle - Barack Obama is coming to Europe!
* Our leaders go after some Obama magic
And so it was, in the fullness of time, before the harvest month of the appointed year, the Child ventured forth - for the first time - to bring the light unto all the world.
He travelled fleet of foot and light of camel, with a small retinue that consisted only of his loyal disciples from the tribe of the Media. He ventured first to the land of the Hindu Kush, where the
Taleban had harboured the viper of al-Qaeda in their bosom, raining terror on all the world.
And the Child spake and the tribes of Nato immediately loosed the Caveats that had previously bound them. And in the great battle that ensued the forces of the light were triumphant. For as long as the Child stood with his arms raised aloft, the enemy suffered great blows and the threat of terror was no more.
From there he went forth to Mesopotamia where he was received by the great ruler al-Maliki, and al-Maliki spake unto him and blessed his Sixteen Month Troop Withdrawal Plan even as the imperial warrior Petraeus tried to destroy it.
And lo, in Mesopotamia, a miracle occurred. Even though the Great Surge of Armour that the evil Bush had ordered had been a terrible mistake, a waste of vital military resources and doomed to end in disaster, the Child's very presence suddenly brought forth a great victory for the forces of the light.
And the Persians, who saw all this and were greatly fearful, longed to speak with the Child and saw that the Child was the bringer of peace. At the mention of his name they quickly laid aside their intrigues and beat their uranium swords into civil nuclear energy ploughshares.
From there the Child went up to the city of Jerusalem, and entered through the gate seated on an ass. The crowds of network anchors who had followed him from afar cheered “Hosanna” and waved great palm fronds and strewed them at his feet.
In Jerusalem and in surrounding Palestine, the Child spake to the Hebrews and the Arabs, as the Scripture had foretold. And in an instant, the lion lay down with the lamb, and the Israelites and Ishmaelites ended their long enmity and lived for ever after in peace.
As word spread throughout the land about the Child's wondrous works, peoples from all over flocked to hear him; Hittites and Abbasids; Obamacons and McCainiacs; Cameroonians and Blairites.
And they told of strange and wondrous things that greeted the news of the Child's journey. Around the world, global temperatures began to decline, and the ocean levels fell and the great warming was over.
The Great Prophet Algore of Nobel and Oscar, who many had believed was the anointed one, smiled and told his followers that the Child was the one generations had been waiting for.
And there were other wonderful signs. In the city of the Street at the Wall, spreads on interbank interest rates dropped like manna from Heaven and rates on credit default swaps fell to the ground as dead birds from the almond tree, and the people who had lived in foreclosure were able to borrow again.
Black gold gushed from the ground at prices well below $140 per barrel. In hospitals across the land the sick were cured even though they were uninsured. And all because the Child had pronounced it.
And this is the testimony of one who speaks the truth and bears witness to the truth so that you might believe. And he knows it is the truth for he saw it all on CNN and the BBC and in the pages of The New York Times.
Then the Child ventured forth from Israel and Palestine and stepped onto the shores of the Old Continent. In the land of Queen Angela of Merkel, vast multitudes gathered to hear his voice, and he preached to them at length.
But when he had finished speaking his disciples told him the crowd was hungry, for they had had nothing to eat all the hours they had waited for him.
And so the Child told his disciples to fetch some food but all they had was five loaves and a couple of frankfurters. So he took the bread and the frankfurters and blessed them and told his disciples to feed the multitudes. And when all had eaten their fill, the scraps filled twelve baskets.
Thence he travelled west to Mount Sarkozy. Even the beauteous Princess Carla of the tribe of the Bruni was struck by awe and she was great in love with the Child, but he was tempted not.
On the Seventh Day he walked across the Channel of the Angles to the ancient land of the hooligans. There he was welcomed with open arms by the once great prophet Blair and his successor, Gordon the Leper, and his successor, David the Golden One.
And suddenly, with the men appeared the archangel Gabriel and the whole host of the heavenly choir, ranks of cherubim and seraphim, all praising God and singing: “Yes, We Can.”
Thursday, July 24, 2008
Visit wounded souldier or go sightseeing?
This is from Powerline.
Politics is largely about priorities; so is life, for that matter. Barack Obama's priorities were put into sharp relief today when he canceled visits to two American military bases in Germany. He still has time, of course, to play the "rock star" in front of cheering multitudes of Germans. Ed Morrissey broke the story:
Der Spiegel’s blog reports on Obama’s priorities:
1:42 p.m.: SPIEGEL ONLINE has learned that Obama has cancelled a planned short visit to the Rammstein and Landstuhl US military bases in the southwest German state of Rhineland-Palatinate. The visits were planned for Friday. “Barack Obama will not be coming to us,” a spokesperson for the US military hospital in Landstuhl announced. “I don’t know why.” Shortly before the same spokeswoman had announced a planned visit by Obama.
The message here is that thousands of screaming German fans at the Tiergarten take precedence over visiting Americans serving their country at Rammstein and Landstuhl. Maybe one of the networks following Obama could interview a few of the soldiers about how they perceive that set of priorities from Obama.
Landstuhl, of course, is where soldiers wounded in Iraq and Afghanistan are sent for treatment. Obama's visit there no doubt would have included meeting some of them.
It turns out that Obama didn't stiff the servicemen because of a schedule conflict. Rather, as Jake Tapper pointed out, apparently without knowing that Obama had canceled planned visits to the two military installations, Obama is going sightseeing in Berlin tonight. I can't say it any better than Ed did:
Obama canceled a previously-planned stop to visit thousands of American service personnel, including troops wounded in Iraq and Afghanistan being treated at Landstuhl, so he could hold a political rally for Germans and go shopping in Berlin. Now that’s a nice set of priorities for a man who wants to become Commander in Chief.
Politics is largely about priorities; so is life, for that matter. Barack Obama's priorities were put into sharp relief today when he canceled visits to two American military bases in Germany. He still has time, of course, to play the "rock star" in front of cheering multitudes of Germans. Ed Morrissey broke the story:
Der Spiegel’s blog reports on Obama’s priorities:
1:42 p.m.: SPIEGEL ONLINE has learned that Obama has cancelled a planned short visit to the Rammstein and Landstuhl US military bases in the southwest German state of Rhineland-Palatinate. The visits were planned for Friday. “Barack Obama will not be coming to us,” a spokesperson for the US military hospital in Landstuhl announced. “I don’t know why.” Shortly before the same spokeswoman had announced a planned visit by Obama.
The message here is that thousands of screaming German fans at the Tiergarten take precedence over visiting Americans serving their country at Rammstein and Landstuhl. Maybe one of the networks following Obama could interview a few of the soldiers about how they perceive that set of priorities from Obama.
Landstuhl, of course, is where soldiers wounded in Iraq and Afghanistan are sent for treatment. Obama's visit there no doubt would have included meeting some of them.
It turns out that Obama didn't stiff the servicemen because of a schedule conflict. Rather, as Jake Tapper pointed out, apparently without knowing that Obama had canceled planned visits to the two military installations, Obama is going sightseeing in Berlin tonight. I can't say it any better than Ed did:
Obama canceled a previously-planned stop to visit thousands of American service personnel, including troops wounded in Iraq and Afghanistan being treated at Landstuhl, so he could hold a political rally for Germans and go shopping in Berlin. Now that’s a nice set of priorities for a man who wants to become Commander in Chief.
Wednesday, July 23, 2008
Scarry video of Michelle Obama
She says. "Obama knows that when he gets elected to be president, we are going to make sacrifices, we are going to change our conversaions, we are going to change our tradition and history! We have to move to a different place!" what does this mean, how can you change history?
A piece of the interview with Terry Moran of ABC
Does this make any sense at all?
"I am not persuaded that 20,000 additional troops in Iraq is going to solve the sectarian violence" in Iraq, Sen. Barack Obama, D-Illinois, said in January 2007. "In fact, I think it will do the reverse."
In Baghdad yesterday, after a day spent witnessing the reduction in violence in Iraq, Obama was asked by ABC News' Terry Moran if he was wrong..
"Here is what I will say," Obama said, "I think that, I did not anticipate, and I think that this is a fair characterization, the convergence of not only the surge but the Sunni awakening in which a whole host of Sunni tribal leaders decided that they had had enough with Al Qaeda, in the Shii’a community the militias standing down to some degrees. So what you had is a combination of political factors inside of Iraq that then came right at the same time as terrific work by our troops. Had those political factors not occurred, I think that my assessment would have been correct."
And he continues to say more stupid things:
If you had to do it over again, Moran asked, knowing what you know now, would you support the surge?
"No," Obama said. "These kinds of hypotheticals are very difficult. Hindsight is 20/20. But I think that what I am absolutely convinced of is at that time we had to change the political debate because the view of the Bush administration at that time was one that I just disagreed with and one that I continue to disagree with is to look narrowly at Iraq and not focus on these broader issues."
"I am not persuaded that 20,000 additional troops in Iraq is going to solve the sectarian violence" in Iraq, Sen. Barack Obama, D-Illinois, said in January 2007. "In fact, I think it will do the reverse."
In Baghdad yesterday, after a day spent witnessing the reduction in violence in Iraq, Obama was asked by ABC News' Terry Moran if he was wrong..
"Here is what I will say," Obama said, "I think that, I did not anticipate, and I think that this is a fair characterization, the convergence of not only the surge but the Sunni awakening in which a whole host of Sunni tribal leaders decided that they had had enough with Al Qaeda, in the Shii’a community the militias standing down to some degrees. So what you had is a combination of political factors inside of Iraq that then came right at the same time as terrific work by our troops. Had those political factors not occurred, I think that my assessment would have been correct."
And he continues to say more stupid things:
If you had to do it over again, Moran asked, knowing what you know now, would you support the surge?
"No," Obama said. "These kinds of hypotheticals are very difficult. Hindsight is 20/20. But I think that what I am absolutely convinced of is at that time we had to change the political debate because the view of the Bush administration at that time was one that I just disagreed with and one that I continue to disagree with is to look narrowly at Iraq and not focus on these broader issues."
Quotes of the day from Obama
“Let me be absolutely clear. Israel is a strong friend of Israel’s.”
“You know, it’s always a bad practice to say ‘always’ or ‘never.’”
“You know, it’s always a bad practice to say ‘always’ or ‘never.’”
Caught in lie
In Israel, Obama tried to claim a little credit for work on a bill done by the Senate Banking Committee — on which he does not serve:Obama is not on the Banking committee. Nor is Obama on any of the subcommittees. If this is not a lie, it is even scarier that he doesn't even know which committees he is on.
Tuesday, July 22, 2008
Article from Rocky mountain news
DNC convention committee gets its own gas-tax holiday
posted at 6:05 pm on July 22, 2008 by Ed Morrissey
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Remember the gas-tax holiday that Barack Obama opposed? Not all Democrats feel the same way — specifically, the Democrats responsible for staging his big party in Denver. The Rocky Mountain News reports this afternoon that the Denver 2008 Convention Host Committee has used the city’s own gas pumps to fill up their cars — bypassing state and federal taxes:
The committee hosting the Democratic National Convention is using the city’s gas pumps to fill up on fuel, avoiding state and federal highway taxes, officials said today.
“There’s something there that just doesn’t seem right to me because, in a sense, you’re saying then that the officials who pass the laws are not willing to live by them, and that concerns me,” Councilwoman Jeanne Faatz said.
The issue came up during the council’s weekly meeting with Mayor John Hickenlooper when the Public Works Department requested authorization to be reimbursed by the Denver 2008 Convention Host Committee for use of “fueling facilities, fuel and car washes.”
“By doing it this way, by running it through our Fleet Maintenance, that means that that fuel does not pay state or federal highway taxes,” Faatz said.
Obama called McCain’s gas-tax holiday proposal “a gimmick” back in April. How would he describe the convention planners’ use of tax-free gasoline while the rest of the country pays its fair share of taxes on fuel? Maybe Obama would like to explain that while he’s talking about hiking fuel taxes to pay for investments in alternative energy sources. Will Democrats be exempt from that tax?
Mayor Hickenlooper tried to play the everyone-does-it card, telling Faatz that the RNC gets the same deal in St Paul. Well, no they don’t:
Teresa McFarland, a spokeswoman for the Minneapolis-St. Paul host committee, said they’re getting their gas at the pump.
“We’re not getting a tax break on fuel,” she said. “That’s not the set-up at this end.”
Democrats taking advantage of city gas pumps save about $6 on every fillup, with taxes over 40 cents per gallon. Tax relief isn’t the only perk for the host committee, either. Car washes eat up a lot of water in a state hit by a drought, which led one councilman to ask:
“Why are we washing cars in the middle of a drought?” he asked. “Where are the green police when we need them? Are they poking around restaurants to see that nobody fries food?”
Why indeed? Weren’t Democrats practically dislocating shoulders in patting themselves on the back for their dedication to conservation at this convention? Why doesn’t the Greening Director put a stop to this? For that matter, why aren’t the Democrats driving hybrids or natural-gas vehicles?
Democrats — making sure only the peasants pay the taxes they impose.
posted at 6:05 pm on July 22, 2008 by Ed Morrissey
Send to a Friend | printer-friendly
Remember the gas-tax holiday that Barack Obama opposed? Not all Democrats feel the same way — specifically, the Democrats responsible for staging his big party in Denver. The Rocky Mountain News reports this afternoon that the Denver 2008 Convention Host Committee has used the city’s own gas pumps to fill up their cars — bypassing state and federal taxes:
The committee hosting the Democratic National Convention is using the city’s gas pumps to fill up on fuel, avoiding state and federal highway taxes, officials said today.
“There’s something there that just doesn’t seem right to me because, in a sense, you’re saying then that the officials who pass the laws are not willing to live by them, and that concerns me,” Councilwoman Jeanne Faatz said.
The issue came up during the council’s weekly meeting with Mayor John Hickenlooper when the Public Works Department requested authorization to be reimbursed by the Denver 2008 Convention Host Committee for use of “fueling facilities, fuel and car washes.”
“By doing it this way, by running it through our Fleet Maintenance, that means that that fuel does not pay state or federal highway taxes,” Faatz said.
Obama called McCain’s gas-tax holiday proposal “a gimmick” back in April. How would he describe the convention planners’ use of tax-free gasoline while the rest of the country pays its fair share of taxes on fuel? Maybe Obama would like to explain that while he’s talking about hiking fuel taxes to pay for investments in alternative energy sources. Will Democrats be exempt from that tax?
Mayor Hickenlooper tried to play the everyone-does-it card, telling Faatz that the RNC gets the same deal in St Paul. Well, no they don’t:
Teresa McFarland, a spokeswoman for the Minneapolis-St. Paul host committee, said they’re getting their gas at the pump.
“We’re not getting a tax break on fuel,” she said. “That’s not the set-up at this end.”
Democrats taking advantage of city gas pumps save about $6 on every fillup, with taxes over 40 cents per gallon. Tax relief isn’t the only perk for the host committee, either. Car washes eat up a lot of water in a state hit by a drought, which led one councilman to ask:
“Why are we washing cars in the middle of a drought?” he asked. “Where are the green police when we need them? Are they poking around restaurants to see that nobody fries food?”
Why indeed? Weren’t Democrats practically dislocating shoulders in patting themselves on the back for their dedication to conservation at this convention? Why doesn’t the Greening Director put a stop to this? For that matter, why aren’t the Democrats driving hybrids or natural-gas vehicles?
Democrats — making sure only the peasants pay the taxes they impose.
Obama asked if he would suport surge if he knew now when he was voting to support the surge.
Which means he would rather we loose the war instead of win.
Monday, July 21, 2008
Instead of a gas-tax holiday, Congress considers gas-tax hike
An article from Hot Air.
John McCain couldn’t convince Congress to adopt his gas-tax holiday, but Congress does plan on making some changes to the rate. Unfortunately, the change will go in the opposite direction, if Democrats get their wish. With Americans driving less, the highway fund faces even more severe shortfalls than expected from lost gas-tax revenue — and so the Democrats plan to hike it up by ten cents a gallon:
Despite calls from the presidential campaign trail for a Memorial Day-to-Labor Day tax freeze, lawmakers quickly concluded — with a prod from the construction industry — that having $9 billion less to spend on highways could create a pre-election specter of thousands of lost jobs.
Now, lawmakers quietly are talking about raising fuel taxes by a dime from the current 18.4 cents a gallon on gasoline and 24.3 cents on diesel fuel. …
Oberstar, D-Minn., said his committee is working on the next long-term highway bill. He estimated it will take between $450 billion and $500 billion over six years to address safety and congestion issues with highways, bridges and transit systems.
“We’ll put all things on the table,” Oberstar said, but the gas tax “is the cornerstone. Nothing else will work without the underpinning of the higher user fee gas tax.”
The problem with the transportation bill isn’t a lack of funds, it’s a lack of fiscal discipline. Oberstar figures prominently in this, earmarking transportation funds for projects like bike and walking path, visitor centers, and other nonsense instead of focusing on the infrastructural needs he decries. Over twelve percent of the last transportation bill consisted of earmarks, with projects like a North Dakota peace garden, a Montana baseball stadium and a Las Vegas history museum.
Pork is the cholesterol of infrastructure. Whenever Congress attempts to address legitimate infrastructure needs, it signals open season on the taxpayers. In that bill last year, over $8 billion got spent on earmarks — the same amount that Congress says will be the shortfall this year for transportation needs, and the deficit they need to erase by raising the gas tax.
When gas was inexpensive, Congress could get away with that. Now that fuel prices have shot through the roof, taxpayers want relief, not a greedy Congress looking to get a piece of the action. If Congress demands sacrifice, then let it start with Congress and eliminate their pet projects from future transportation bills. The gas-tax holiday may be a silly idea, but a gas-tax penalty at this point in time has to set a record for political stupidity.
John McCain couldn’t convince Congress to adopt his gas-tax holiday, but Congress does plan on making some changes to the rate. Unfortunately, the change will go in the opposite direction, if Democrats get their wish. With Americans driving less, the highway fund faces even more severe shortfalls than expected from lost gas-tax revenue — and so the Democrats plan to hike it up by ten cents a gallon:
Despite calls from the presidential campaign trail for a Memorial Day-to-Labor Day tax freeze, lawmakers quickly concluded — with a prod from the construction industry — that having $9 billion less to spend on highways could create a pre-election specter of thousands of lost jobs.
Now, lawmakers quietly are talking about raising fuel taxes by a dime from the current 18.4 cents a gallon on gasoline and 24.3 cents on diesel fuel. …
Oberstar, D-Minn., said his committee is working on the next long-term highway bill. He estimated it will take between $450 billion and $500 billion over six years to address safety and congestion issues with highways, bridges and transit systems.
“We’ll put all things on the table,” Oberstar said, but the gas tax “is the cornerstone. Nothing else will work without the underpinning of the higher user fee gas tax.”
The problem with the transportation bill isn’t a lack of funds, it’s a lack of fiscal discipline. Oberstar figures prominently in this, earmarking transportation funds for projects like bike and walking path, visitor centers, and other nonsense instead of focusing on the infrastructural needs he decries. Over twelve percent of the last transportation bill consisted of earmarks, with projects like a North Dakota peace garden, a Montana baseball stadium and a Las Vegas history museum.
Pork is the cholesterol of infrastructure. Whenever Congress attempts to address legitimate infrastructure needs, it signals open season on the taxpayers. In that bill last year, over $8 billion got spent on earmarks — the same amount that Congress says will be the shortfall this year for transportation needs, and the deficit they need to erase by raising the gas tax.
When gas was inexpensive, Congress could get away with that. Now that fuel prices have shot through the roof, taxpayers want relief, not a greedy Congress looking to get a piece of the action. If Congress demands sacrifice, then let it start with Congress and eliminate their pet projects from future transportation bills. The gas-tax holiday may be a silly idea, but a gas-tax penalty at this point in time has to set a record for political stupidity.
Great article from Redstate about IRS numbers released today.
Adding a dose of reality to the KnownFact of "tax cuts for the rich" and an increase in the "wealth gap"
Posted by: Jeff Emanuel
Monday, July 21, 2008 at 09:17AM
15 Comments
Members of the Democrat Congress are dusting off their handy rubber stamps (or unwrapping new ones, inscribed with the new Presidential motto, "Vero Possumus") in preparation for the round of tax hikes their assumed President-in-Waiting is promising to send down the pipe next Spring in the name of "making the rich pay their fair share."
Not to let real facts get in the way of their red-headed stepsibling KnownFacts™, but the latest tax data from the IRS have been released and, as a Wall Street Journal editorial says today, "it's going to be hard for the rich to pay any more than they already do."
According to the National Center for Policy Analysis, which released a summary of new tax information this morning, "The new IRS data show that the 2003 Bush tax cuts caused what may be the biggest increase in tax payments by the rich in American history."
According to the IRS data, the top 1 percent of taxpayers paid 40 percent of all income taxes in 2006, the highest share in at least 40 years.
Further, the top 10 percent of income-earners paid 71 percent , and the top 50 percent in income paid 97.1 percent .
On the other end of the spectrum, Americans with an income below the median paid a record-low 2.9 percent of all income taxes. So much for the fabled unbearable tax burden on the lower-middle and lower classes, from whom the "rich," who refuse to "pay their fair share," are so wantonly stealing.
More very revealing information is available to the open-minded below the fold.
According to the WSJ, "We also know from income mobility data that a very large percentage in the top 1 percent are "new rich," not inheritors of fortunes." So much for the rich getting richer, the poor getting poorer, and the lines between "class" in America becoming impenetrable ceilings and floors.
"But the most amazing part of this story," continue the WSJ's editors, "is the leap in the number of Americans who declared adjusted gross income of more than $1 million from 2003 to 2006"
According to the IRS data, the number of millionaires in the U.S. nearly doubled in the three years after the Bush tax cuts, from 181,000 to 354,000. The Left might call this the "rich getting richer," but the economically honest would more likely refer to this as the hard-working getting over the hump and creating more wealth for themselves and for others.
Unfortunately for the newly (and already) "rich," another result of Bush tax policy was a doubling in the amount of taxes paid by millionaire households, from $136 billion in 2003 to $274 billion in 2006 -- an increase in tax payments that, according to the WSJ, explain the very rapid reduction in the budget deficit to 1.9 percent of gross domestic product (GDP) in 2006 from 3.5 percent in 2003."
As we've known for quite some time now, "the idea that [the Bush tax cuts have] been a giveaway to the rich is a figment of the left's imagination," the WSJ editorial concludes. "No President has ever plied more money from the rich than George W. Bush did with his 2003 tax cuts."
Posted by: Jeff Emanuel
Monday, July 21, 2008 at 09:17AM
15 Comments
Members of the Democrat Congress are dusting off their handy rubber stamps (or unwrapping new ones, inscribed with the new Presidential motto, "Vero Possumus") in preparation for the round of tax hikes their assumed President-in-Waiting is promising to send down the pipe next Spring in the name of "making the rich pay their fair share."
Not to let real facts get in the way of their red-headed stepsibling KnownFacts™, but the latest tax data from the IRS have been released and, as a Wall Street Journal editorial says today, "it's going to be hard for the rich to pay any more than they already do."
According to the National Center for Policy Analysis, which released a summary of new tax information this morning, "The new IRS data show that the 2003 Bush tax cuts caused what may be the biggest increase in tax payments by the rich in American history."
According to the IRS data, the top 1 percent of taxpayers paid 40 percent of all income taxes in 2006, the highest share in at least 40 years.
Further, the top 10 percent of income-earners paid 71 percent , and the top 50 percent in income paid 97.1 percent .
On the other end of the spectrum, Americans with an income below the median paid a record-low 2.9 percent of all income taxes. So much for the fabled unbearable tax burden on the lower-middle and lower classes, from whom the "rich," who refuse to "pay their fair share," are so wantonly stealing.
More very revealing information is available to the open-minded below the fold.
According to the WSJ, "We also know from income mobility data that a very large percentage in the top 1 percent are "new rich," not inheritors of fortunes." So much for the rich getting richer, the poor getting poorer, and the lines between "class" in America becoming impenetrable ceilings and floors.
"But the most amazing part of this story," continue the WSJ's editors, "is the leap in the number of Americans who declared adjusted gross income of more than $1 million from 2003 to 2006"
According to the IRS data, the number of millionaires in the U.S. nearly doubled in the three years after the Bush tax cuts, from 181,000 to 354,000. The Left might call this the "rich getting richer," but the economically honest would more likely refer to this as the hard-working getting over the hump and creating more wealth for themselves and for others.
Unfortunately for the newly (and already) "rich," another result of Bush tax policy was a doubling in the amount of taxes paid by millionaire households, from $136 billion in 2003 to $274 billion in 2006 -- an increase in tax payments that, according to the WSJ, explain the very rapid reduction in the budget deficit to 1.9 percent of gross domestic product (GDP) in 2006 from 3.5 percent in 2003."
As we've known for quite some time now, "the idea that [the Bush tax cuts have] been a giveaway to the rich is a figment of the left's imagination," the WSJ editorial concludes. "No President has ever plied more money from the rich than George W. Bush did with his 2003 tax cuts."
Blowing the whistle on global warming
Here is an article I found on Powerline Blog.
David Evans was a consultant to the "Australian Greenhouse Office" from 1999 to 2005. He is a former global warming alarmist; however, he is also a scientist who goes where the evidence leads him. In this important article in The Australian, he blows the whistle on the fraud that many of the world's governments are in the midst of perpetrating:
I DEVOTED six years to carbon accounting, building models for the Australian Greenhouse Office. I am the rocket scientist who wrote the carbon accounting model (FullCAM) that measures Australia's compliance with the Kyoto Protocol, in the land use change and forestry sector.
FullCAM models carbon flows in plants, mulch, debris, soils and agricultural products, using inputs such as climate data, plant physiology and satellite data. I've been following the global warming debate closely for years.
When I started that job in 1999 the evidence that carbon emissions caused global warming seemed pretty good: CO2 is a greenhouse gas, the old ice core data, no other suspects.
The evidence was not conclusive, but why wait until we were certain when it appeared we needed to act quickly? Soon government and the scientific community were working together and lots of science research jobs were created. We scientists had political support, the ear of government, big budgets, and we felt fairly important and useful (well, I did anyway). It was great. We were working to save the planet.
But since 1999 new evidence has seriously weakened the case that carbon emissions are the main cause of global warming, and by 2007 the evidence was pretty conclusive that carbon played only a minor role and was not the main cause of the recent global warming. As Lord Keynes famously said, "When the facts change, I change my mind. What do you do, sir?"
There has not been a public debate about the causes of global warming and most of the public and our decision makers are not aware of the most basic salient facts.
You really need to read the whole thing to get the full impact, but here are a few highlights:
1. The greenhouse signature is missing. We have been looking and measuring for years, and cannot find it.
Each possible cause of global warming has a different pattern of where in the planet the warming occurs first and the most. The signature of an increased greenhouse effect is a hot spot about 10km up in the atmosphere over the tropics. We have been measuring the atmosphere for decades using radiosondes: weather balloons with thermometers that radio back the temperature as the balloon ascends through the atmosphere. They show no hot spot. Whatsoever.
If there is no hot spot then an increased greenhouse effect is not the cause of global warming. So we know for sure that carbon emissions are not a significant cause of the global warming. ...
2. There is no evidence to support the idea that carbon emissions cause significant global warming. None. ...
3. The satellites that measure the world's temperature all say that the warming trend ended in 2001, and that the temperature has dropped about 0.6C in the past year (to the temperature of 1980). ...
4. The new ice cores show that in the past six global warmings over the past half a million years, the temperature rises occurred on average 800 years before the accompanying rise in atmospheric carbon. Which says something important about which was cause and which was effect. ...
The last point was known and past dispute by 2003, yet Al Gore made his movie in 2005 and presented the ice cores as the sole reason for believing that carbon emissions cause global warming. In any other political context our cynical and experienced press corps would surely have called this dishonest and widely questioned the politician's assertion. ..
What is going to happen over the next decade as global temperatures continue not to rise? The Labor Government is about to deliberately wreck the economy in order to reduce carbon emissions. If the reasons later turn out to be bogus, the electorate is not going to re-elect a Labor government for a long time. When it comes to light that the carbon scare was known to be bogus in 2008, the ALP is going to be regarded as criminally negligent or ideologically stupid for not having seen through it.
David Evans was a consultant to the "Australian Greenhouse Office" from 1999 to 2005. He is a former global warming alarmist; however, he is also a scientist who goes where the evidence leads him. In this important article in The Australian, he blows the whistle on the fraud that many of the world's governments are in the midst of perpetrating:
I DEVOTED six years to carbon accounting, building models for the Australian Greenhouse Office. I am the rocket scientist who wrote the carbon accounting model (FullCAM) that measures Australia's compliance with the Kyoto Protocol, in the land use change and forestry sector.
FullCAM models carbon flows in plants, mulch, debris, soils and agricultural products, using inputs such as climate data, plant physiology and satellite data. I've been following the global warming debate closely for years.
When I started that job in 1999 the evidence that carbon emissions caused global warming seemed pretty good: CO2 is a greenhouse gas, the old ice core data, no other suspects.
The evidence was not conclusive, but why wait until we were certain when it appeared we needed to act quickly? Soon government and the scientific community were working together and lots of science research jobs were created. We scientists had political support, the ear of government, big budgets, and we felt fairly important and useful (well, I did anyway). It was great. We were working to save the planet.
But since 1999 new evidence has seriously weakened the case that carbon emissions are the main cause of global warming, and by 2007 the evidence was pretty conclusive that carbon played only a minor role and was not the main cause of the recent global warming. As Lord Keynes famously said, "When the facts change, I change my mind. What do you do, sir?"
There has not been a public debate about the causes of global warming and most of the public and our decision makers are not aware of the most basic salient facts.
You really need to read the whole thing to get the full impact, but here are a few highlights:
1. The greenhouse signature is missing. We have been looking and measuring for years, and cannot find it.
Each possible cause of global warming has a different pattern of where in the planet the warming occurs first and the most. The signature of an increased greenhouse effect is a hot spot about 10km up in the atmosphere over the tropics. We have been measuring the atmosphere for decades using radiosondes: weather balloons with thermometers that radio back the temperature as the balloon ascends through the atmosphere. They show no hot spot. Whatsoever.
If there is no hot spot then an increased greenhouse effect is not the cause of global warming. So we know for sure that carbon emissions are not a significant cause of the global warming. ...
2. There is no evidence to support the idea that carbon emissions cause significant global warming. None. ...
3. The satellites that measure the world's temperature all say that the warming trend ended in 2001, and that the temperature has dropped about 0.6C in the past year (to the temperature of 1980). ...
4. The new ice cores show that in the past six global warmings over the past half a million years, the temperature rises occurred on average 800 years before the accompanying rise in atmospheric carbon. Which says something important about which was cause and which was effect. ...
The last point was known and past dispute by 2003, yet Al Gore made his movie in 2005 and presented the ice cores as the sole reason for believing that carbon emissions cause global warming. In any other political context our cynical and experienced press corps would surely have called this dishonest and widely questioned the politician's assertion. ..
What is going to happen over the next decade as global temperatures continue not to rise? The Labor Government is about to deliberately wreck the economy in order to reduce carbon emissions. If the reasons later turn out to be bogus, the electorate is not going to re-elect a Labor government for a long time. When it comes to light that the carbon scare was known to be bogus in 2008, the ALP is going to be regarded as criminally negligent or ideologically stupid for not having seen through it.
Here is a letter from My rep in the House, Michele Bachmann
Right now, I am rounding up my American Energy Tour, having visited the National Renewable Energy Lab (NREL) in Colorado and spots in Alaska’s North Slope, including ANWR, over the weekend. And, I am more optimistic than ever about America’s ability to attain energy independence and cut gas prices in half.
At NREL, my colleagues and I literally walked through America’s energy future. The research going on there is top notch and cutting edge. What I was most impressed with was the work that the lab is doing with a variety of vehicles run by renewable energy including: Plug-In Hybrid Vehicles, Hydrogen Fuel Cell Vehicles, and Solar Hybrid Electric Vehicles. We also investigated the programs of Wind to Hydrogen Technologies and received an overview of the Lab’s Biomass Technologies.
In Alaska, there’s a virtual treasure trove of energy opportunities. We visited the Trans-Alaskan Pipeline, Prudhoe Bay, and the National Petroleum Reserve-Alaska. And, of course, we visited ANWR, specifically the “10-02 area,” which could relieve so much of the gas crunch we feel if only we would allow it to be accessed.
Officials in the North Slope confirmed for us that this area could provide an incredible amount of petroleum (10.4 billion barrels) with a minimal environmental footprint. ANWR in its entirety measures 19 million acres, but this one oil-rich location where we are interested in drilling is a mere 2,000 acres. To give you a better picture of what that means, the area for drilling is the size of a postage stamp on a football field. Couple that fact with the proximity of the 10-02 area to the Trans-Alaskan pipeline, and this area would provide us with the most convenient and efficient route to get more petroleum to the continental United States.
America has to dedicate itself to an All-of-the-Above strategy if we are to cut gas prices, create energy-related jobs, and ease current pressures on our economy. This fact-finding trip makes me more certain than ever that America has the ability to not only weather this energy storm, but to emerge from it a worldwide energy leader.
At NREL, my colleagues and I literally walked through America’s energy future. The research going on there is top notch and cutting edge. What I was most impressed with was the work that the lab is doing with a variety of vehicles run by renewable energy including: Plug-In Hybrid Vehicles, Hydrogen Fuel Cell Vehicles, and Solar Hybrid Electric Vehicles. We also investigated the programs of Wind to Hydrogen Technologies and received an overview of the Lab’s Biomass Technologies.
In Alaska, there’s a virtual treasure trove of energy opportunities. We visited the Trans-Alaskan Pipeline, Prudhoe Bay, and the National Petroleum Reserve-Alaska. And, of course, we visited ANWR, specifically the “10-02 area,” which could relieve so much of the gas crunch we feel if only we would allow it to be accessed.
Officials in the North Slope confirmed for us that this area could provide an incredible amount of petroleum (10.4 billion barrels) with a minimal environmental footprint. ANWR in its entirety measures 19 million acres, but this one oil-rich location where we are interested in drilling is a mere 2,000 acres. To give you a better picture of what that means, the area for drilling is the size of a postage stamp on a football field. Couple that fact with the proximity of the 10-02 area to the Trans-Alaskan pipeline, and this area would provide us with the most convenient and efficient route to get more petroleum to the continental United States.
America has to dedicate itself to an All-of-the-Above strategy if we are to cut gas prices, create energy-related jobs, and ease current pressures on our economy. This fact-finding trip makes me more certain than ever that America has the ability to not only weather this energy storm, but to emerge from it a worldwide energy leader.
Saturday, July 19, 2008
Now the Pope is on the bandwagon for Global warming
Why is it that all the people that are preaching to us to use less and lower our consumption to save the planet, never lead by example.
The pope said on Thursday mankind's "insatiable consumption" has scarred the Earth and squandered its resources, telling followers that taking care of the planet is vital to humanity.
The pope is an absolute monarch of Vatican city, he has total control of it. I haven't heard they are selling some of the art collection to save money, or cutting down on power usage. My guess is he didn't fly to Australia on a commercial airline, and he doesn't take public transportation. I bet he has everything he wants and needs everyday. I don't have a problem with that until you start telling everyone else that they have to cut back.
Still I do not get why Al Gore or the Pope, or anyone else feels that they have the right and knowledge to tell everyone else what the earths perfect temperature is. The temp of the earth has varied up and down all through time, long before we were driving cars and using fossil fuels. The hottest 3 year stretch in the U.S. since records have been kept were 1932 1933 1934, there were not many cars then, and not nearly as much co2 going into the air as now.
Co2 is not pollution, it is needed for all life on earth. It is what plants need to live, without plants we would not be able to live. Warming temps will also be better for plants, they can grow where they couldn't at colder temps. That will mean more food can be grown where it was not able to grow before. There are hundreds or reasons that warm is better than colder. It is also very obvious to any rational thinking person that the greatest effect on the earths temp is going to be caused by the sun.
The pope said on Thursday mankind's "insatiable consumption" has scarred the Earth and squandered its resources, telling followers that taking care of the planet is vital to humanity.
The pope is an absolute monarch of Vatican city, he has total control of it. I haven't heard they are selling some of the art collection to save money, or cutting down on power usage. My guess is he didn't fly to Australia on a commercial airline, and he doesn't take public transportation. I bet he has everything he wants and needs everyday. I don't have a problem with that until you start telling everyone else that they have to cut back.
Still I do not get why Al Gore or the Pope, or anyone else feels that they have the right and knowledge to tell everyone else what the earths perfect temperature is. The temp of the earth has varied up and down all through time, long before we were driving cars and using fossil fuels. The hottest 3 year stretch in the U.S. since records have been kept were 1932 1933 1934, there were not many cars then, and not nearly as much co2 going into the air as now.
Co2 is not pollution, it is needed for all life on earth. It is what plants need to live, without plants we would not be able to live. Warming temps will also be better for plants, they can grow where they couldn't at colder temps. That will mean more food can be grown where it was not able to grow before. There are hundreds or reasons that warm is better than colder. It is also very obvious to any rational thinking person that the greatest effect on the earths temp is going to be caused by the sun.
Friday, July 18, 2008
Myth of Consensus Explodes: APS Opens Global Warming Debate
The American Physical Society, an organization representing nearly 50,000 physicists, has reversed its stance on climate change and is now proclaiming that many of its members disbelieve in human-induced global warming. The APS is also sponsoring public debate on the validity of global warming science. The leadership of the society had previously called the evidence for global warming "incontrovertible."
In a posting to the APS forum, editor Jeffrey Marque explains,"There is a considerable presence within the scientific community of people who do not agree with the IPCC conclusion that anthropogenic CO2 emissions are very probably likely to be primarily responsible for global warming that has occurred since the Industrial Revolution."
The APS is opening its debate with the publication of a paper by Lord Monckton of Brenchley, which concludes that climate sensitivity -- the rate of temperature change a given amount of greenhouse gas will cause -- has been grossly overstated by IPCC modeling. A low sensitivity implies additional atmospheric CO2 will have little effect on global climate.
Larry Gould, Professor of Physics at the University of Hartford and Chairman of the New England Section of the APS, called Monckton's paper an "expose of the IPCC that details numerous exaggerations and "extensive errors"
In an email to DailyTech, Monckton says, "I was dismayed to discover that the IPCC's 2001 and 2007 reports did not devote chapters to the central 'climate sensitivity' question, and did not explain in proper, systematic detail the methods by which they evaluated it. When I began to investigate, it seemed that the IPCC was deliberately concealing and obscuring its method."
According to Monckton, there is substantial support for his results, "in the peer-reviewed literature, most articles on climate sensitivity conclude, as I have done, that climate sensitivity must be harmlessly low."
Monckton, who was the science advisor to Britain's Thatcher administration, says natural variability is the cause of most of the Earth's recent warming. "In the past 70 years the Sun was more active than at almost any other time in the past 11,400 years ... Mars, Jupiter, Neptune’s largest moon, and Pluto warmed at the same time as Earth."
In a posting to the APS forum, editor Jeffrey Marque explains,"There is a considerable presence within the scientific community of people who do not agree with the IPCC conclusion that anthropogenic CO2 emissions are very probably likely to be primarily responsible for global warming that has occurred since the Industrial Revolution."
The APS is opening its debate with the publication of a paper by Lord Monckton of Brenchley, which concludes that climate sensitivity -- the rate of temperature change a given amount of greenhouse gas will cause -- has been grossly overstated by IPCC modeling. A low sensitivity implies additional atmospheric CO2 will have little effect on global climate.
Larry Gould, Professor of Physics at the University of Hartford and Chairman of the New England Section of the APS, called Monckton's paper an "expose of the IPCC that details numerous exaggerations and "extensive errors"
In an email to DailyTech, Monckton says, "I was dismayed to discover that the IPCC's 2001 and 2007 reports did not devote chapters to the central 'climate sensitivity' question, and did not explain in proper, systematic detail the methods by which they evaluated it. When I began to investigate, it seemed that the IPCC was deliberately concealing and obscuring its method."
According to Monckton, there is substantial support for his results, "in the peer-reviewed literature, most articles on climate sensitivity conclude, as I have done, that climate sensitivity must be harmlessly low."
Monckton, who was the science advisor to Britain's Thatcher administration, says natural variability is the cause of most of the Earth's recent warming. "In the past 70 years the Sun was more active than at almost any other time in the past 11,400 years ... Mars, Jupiter, Neptune’s largest moon, and Pluto warmed at the same time as Earth."
Great article from David Harsanyi of the Denver Post
July 18, 2008
What Dems Can't Say About Drilling
By David Harsanyi
One day Americans are moaning about the harmful impact of cheap oil and the next they're grousing about the harmful impact of expensive oil.
Which one is it?
As a disreputable sort, I freely confess to having a fondness for oil. Actually, I have a mild crush on all carbon-emitting fuels that feed our prosperity. But I'm especially fond of cheap oil. For many years, those who spread apocalyptic global-warming scenarios have warned me that a collective national sacrifice was needed to save the world.
One option, we were told, was to make gas artificially expensive, forcing our ignorant, energy-gobbling neighbors to alter their destructive habits.
Well, here we are. At $4 a gallon for gas, we already have a flailing economy. Isn't it glorious? And isn't it exactly what many environmentalists desired?
The problem is that there is no feasible "alternative" fuel that can haul food from farms to cities, produce affordable electricity for your plasma TV and drive your kids to school. Not yet. It can happen, of course, but only (to pinch a word from enlightened grocery shoppers) organically.
The problem is that when "green" fantasies crash onto the shores of economic reality (as they did with corn-based ethanol), we all suffer.
Don't worry, though, congressional Democrats have a bold plan. Hold on for 10 or 15 years and they'll have a bounty of energy options. They promise. But no oil shale. No clean coal. No nuclear power. And definitely no more oil.
They will not enable your revolting, inefficient lifestyle. In the short-term, offshore drilling, especially, is a pie-in-the-sky fairy tale. Unlike, say, pond scum and hydrogen fuel packs.
On the bright side, it seems that reality is beginning to overtake fantasy. This week, Newt Gingrich's American Solutions for Winning the Future group delivered 1.3 million signatures to Congress, demanding that Washington allow more drilling. A recent Zogby International polls shows 74 percent of likely voters support offshore drilling in U.S. coastal waters, and 59 percent favor drilling for oil in the tundra of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge.
There are few issues in America that offer this kind of impressive "unity." But apparently when unity doesn't align with left-wing orthodoxy, we need more "leadership" to explain why we're wrong.
Presumptive presidential nominee Barack Obama called offshore drilling a "gimmick." According to other Democrats, prices would not be affected for five years and oil companies probably would not use the leases anyway.
If oil giants won't dig, it surely can't hurt to allow leasing. Who knows? They may.
As for waiting? Well, rest assured an increase in domestic oil supply will involve a lot less waiting than the emergence of switchgrass as a viable alternative.
More importantly, oil is a traded commodity and, as everyone knows, the price can fluctuate for a number of reasons beyond supply.
Take President Bush's ceremonial lifting of the moratorium on offshore drilling this week. By happenstance, I guess, within the next three days the price of oil per barrel had fallen more than $15 — the largest such drop in five years.
So why can't Americans look forward to more domestic oil? Well, because carbon is bad for you. Because countless Democrats believe that high prices will help wean us off this terrible addiction.
For many, environmental concerns outweigh the economic well-being of citizens. For some, the migratory paths of caribou trump your selfish habit of heating and cooling your home.
No, drilling isn't "the answer." Yet, the potential positives from increasing domestic supply outweigh any concerns of the opposition. Certainly any they can talk about in public.
Reach columnist David Harsanyi at dharsanyi@denverpost.com.
What Dems Can't Say About Drilling
By David Harsanyi
One day Americans are moaning about the harmful impact of cheap oil and the next they're grousing about the harmful impact of expensive oil.
Which one is it?
As a disreputable sort, I freely confess to having a fondness for oil. Actually, I have a mild crush on all carbon-emitting fuels that feed our prosperity. But I'm especially fond of cheap oil. For many years, those who spread apocalyptic global-warming scenarios have warned me that a collective national sacrifice was needed to save the world.
One option, we were told, was to make gas artificially expensive, forcing our ignorant, energy-gobbling neighbors to alter their destructive habits.
Well, here we are. At $4 a gallon for gas, we already have a flailing economy. Isn't it glorious? And isn't it exactly what many environmentalists desired?
The problem is that there is no feasible "alternative" fuel that can haul food from farms to cities, produce affordable electricity for your plasma TV and drive your kids to school. Not yet. It can happen, of course, but only (to pinch a word from enlightened grocery shoppers) organically.
The problem is that when "green" fantasies crash onto the shores of economic reality (as they did with corn-based ethanol), we all suffer.
Don't worry, though, congressional Democrats have a bold plan. Hold on for 10 or 15 years and they'll have a bounty of energy options. They promise. But no oil shale. No clean coal. No nuclear power. And definitely no more oil.
They will not enable your revolting, inefficient lifestyle. In the short-term, offshore drilling, especially, is a pie-in-the-sky fairy tale. Unlike, say, pond scum and hydrogen fuel packs.
On the bright side, it seems that reality is beginning to overtake fantasy. This week, Newt Gingrich's American Solutions for Winning the Future group delivered 1.3 million signatures to Congress, demanding that Washington allow more drilling. A recent Zogby International polls shows 74 percent of likely voters support offshore drilling in U.S. coastal waters, and 59 percent favor drilling for oil in the tundra of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge.
There are few issues in America that offer this kind of impressive "unity." But apparently when unity doesn't align with left-wing orthodoxy, we need more "leadership" to explain why we're wrong.
Presumptive presidential nominee Barack Obama called offshore drilling a "gimmick." According to other Democrats, prices would not be affected for five years and oil companies probably would not use the leases anyway.
If oil giants won't dig, it surely can't hurt to allow leasing. Who knows? They may.
As for waiting? Well, rest assured an increase in domestic oil supply will involve a lot less waiting than the emergence of switchgrass as a viable alternative.
More importantly, oil is a traded commodity and, as everyone knows, the price can fluctuate for a number of reasons beyond supply.
Take President Bush's ceremonial lifting of the moratorium on offshore drilling this week. By happenstance, I guess, within the next three days the price of oil per barrel had fallen more than $15 — the largest such drop in five years.
So why can't Americans look forward to more domestic oil? Well, because carbon is bad for you. Because countless Democrats believe that high prices will help wean us off this terrible addiction.
For many, environmental concerns outweigh the economic well-being of citizens. For some, the migratory paths of caribou trump your selfish habit of heating and cooling your home.
No, drilling isn't "the answer." Yet, the potential positives from increasing domestic supply outweigh any concerns of the opposition. Certainly any they can talk about in public.
Reach columnist David Harsanyi at dharsanyi@denverpost.com.
Thursday, July 17, 2008
How the media is covering the Presidential race
Here is an article from the Media research center on the coverage of McCain and Obama and the bias that they have. They are not even trying to hide it anymore.
ALEXANDRIA, VA – In yet another example of slavish adoration, all three network evening news anchors, Brian Williams, Charlie Gibson and Katie Couric, will accompany Illinois Senator Barack Obama on his trip to Europe and the Middle East in August, and deliver their daily broadcasts live from each of the locales along the way.
How outrageous is this? Arizona Senator John McCain has made three trips overseas since March. No anchor has travelled with him on any of them and they provided little if any coverage of any of them.
Sen. McCain went to Europe and the Middle East for a week in March, and the Big Three evening news programs had a total of only four full stories on the trip; one, by NBC’s Kelly O’Donnell, was dedicated to McCain mistakenly saying Iran is aiding al-Qaeda in Iraq. CBS did not even send a correspondent along, and offered only one report consisting of only thirty-one words the entire week Sen. McCain was abroad.
None of the Three networks covered Sen. McCain’s trip to Canada in June at all.
MRC President L. Brent Bozell:
“The liberal media’s shameless slavishness to Sen. Barack Obama knows no bounds. Just when you think they can’t hit any new highs in journalistic lows, they outdo themselves, going into the outer limits of biased coverage.
“The liberal media obviously cannot help themselves. They are already neck-deep in the tank for Sen. Obama, yet they have made the decision that still there just hasn’t been enough loving coverage of him. So the Big Three networks all determined that the remedy would be to go on the road for live daily on-air massages.
“This trip with Sen. Obama must be like the Grateful Dead, the Rolling Stones and the Beatles all rolled into one for the liberal media. For all three nightly news anchors to get to go on the road with him must be a dream come true.
“Brian, Charlie and Katie could prove that they haven’t totally sold-out to Sen. Obama if on this trip they actually subject the candidate to tough questions about his liberal policies and flip flops. But who are we kidding? It will never happen.
“Thus far, with the liberal media’s ceaseless and glowing coverage of Sen. Obama to the exclusion of virtually all else, no wonder Americans are thinking that we are in the midst of a coronation, not an election.”
ALEXANDRIA, VA – In yet another example of slavish adoration, all three network evening news anchors, Brian Williams, Charlie Gibson and Katie Couric, will accompany Illinois Senator Barack Obama on his trip to Europe and the Middle East in August, and deliver their daily broadcasts live from each of the locales along the way.
How outrageous is this? Arizona Senator John McCain has made three trips overseas since March. No anchor has travelled with him on any of them and they provided little if any coverage of any of them.
Sen. McCain went to Europe and the Middle East for a week in March, and the Big Three evening news programs had a total of only four full stories on the trip; one, by NBC’s Kelly O’Donnell, was dedicated to McCain mistakenly saying Iran is aiding al-Qaeda in Iraq. CBS did not even send a correspondent along, and offered only one report consisting of only thirty-one words the entire week Sen. McCain was abroad.
None of the Three networks covered Sen. McCain’s trip to Canada in June at all.
MRC President L. Brent Bozell:
“The liberal media’s shameless slavishness to Sen. Barack Obama knows no bounds. Just when you think they can’t hit any new highs in journalistic lows, they outdo themselves, going into the outer limits of biased coverage.
“The liberal media obviously cannot help themselves. They are already neck-deep in the tank for Sen. Obama, yet they have made the decision that still there just hasn’t been enough loving coverage of him. So the Big Three networks all determined that the remedy would be to go on the road for live daily on-air massages.
“This trip with Sen. Obama must be like the Grateful Dead, the Rolling Stones and the Beatles all rolled into one for the liberal media. For all three nightly news anchors to get to go on the road with him must be a dream come true.
“Brian, Charlie and Katie could prove that they haven’t totally sold-out to Sen. Obama if on this trip they actually subject the candidate to tough questions about his liberal policies and flip flops. But who are we kidding? It will never happen.
“Thus far, with the liberal media’s ceaseless and glowing coverage of Sen. Obama to the exclusion of virtually all else, no wonder Americans are thinking that we are in the midst of a coronation, not an election.”
Wednesday, July 16, 2008
Part of an Op ed piece that Obama had published in the local Chicago newspaper 8 days after 9/11/01
We must also engage, however, in the more difficult task of understanding the sources of such madness. The essence of this tragedy, it seems to me, derives from a fundamental absence of empathy on the part of the attackers: an inability to imagine, or connect with, the humanity and suffering of others. Such a failure of empathy, such numbness to the pain of a child or the desperation of a parent, is not innate; nor, history tells us, is it unique to a particular culture, religion, or ethnicity. It may find expression in a particular brand of violence, and may be channeled by particular demagogues or fanatics. Most often, though, it grows out of a climate of poverty and ignorance, helplessness and despair.”
Even the terrorists didn't say this. They said why they did it, to get back at the U.S. and kill the infidels. Not because we didn't understand their culture and poverty.
Even the terrorists didn't say this. They said why they did it, to get back at the U.S. and kill the infidels. Not because we didn't understand their culture and poverty.
Tuesday, July 15, 2008
Who doesn’t the Prince of Privilege talk down to?
Here is an article from Conservative edge.
Noted far left wing New York Times columnist Maureen Dowd says that calling Barak Obama a “liberal elitist” is a smear. Although she does admit that Obama is aloof, dismissive and has an air of a prince of privilege. Coming from a left wing dilettante like Dowd, that is quite an assessment.
And therein lays the essence of one of Barak Obama’s biggest weaknesses, he carries an air of condescension that is normally not appealing to the American electorate. Just ask John Kerry, Al Gore and Michael Dukakis. Except that Obama is far worse than any of those presidential losers.
Last week, the issue raised its ugly head when Jesse Jackson whispered into a hot mic that he would like to castrate Obama for “talking down” to blacks. Which raises the question: Who doesn’t the Prince of Privilege talk down to?
Americans were first treated to the Obama arrogance en masse, when he told a group of San Francisco liberal elitists that Americans in the heartland cling to God and guns out of desperation. Those remarks put the Reagan Democrats demographics in jeopardy for the Democratic nominee.
Female Clinton supporters also smelled the Obama condescension odor towards women. Just ask Geraldine Ferraro what she thinks of Obama's condescension towards women. Many have referred to Obama as a misogynist. This feeling was reinforced when Obama called a female reporter “sweetie” when she addressed a pointed question to Obama.
Lately, some Clinton supporters have borne the brunt of the Obama arrogance when he told them to “just get over it” referring to the Democratic primary. They believe that Obama is paying lip service to the idea of “unity” in order to get their money.
As well, Obama has taken extraordinarily arrogant steps in his campaign. In addition to creating his own presidential seal, he has proposed making a campaign speech at Germany’s Brandenburg Gate, a spot traditionally reserved for world leaders, and has moved his acceptance speech from a "smallish" in door 19,000 seat convention center to a 75,000 seat outdoor stadium. Obama’s camp told network news execs to get over it, when they balked at the cost of moving their operations to include the new venue.
Even Obama’s wife Michelle exudes arrogance and contempt for the little people. Yesterday she sneered at the government tax rebate checks being sent to Americans as part of a bi-partisan stimulus package, as to small. You could buy a pair of earrings with the $600.00 checks but not much else, she told the assembled crowd.
One has to wonder if we Americans are worthy of Barak Obama. As Michelle told one crowd, this is our only chance to get Barak. He won’t run for President again. I don’t know whether to genuflect or kiss his ring.
Posted By:Brian Goettl @ 7/13/2008 8:24:00 PM
Noted far left wing New York Times columnist Maureen Dowd says that calling Barak Obama a “liberal elitist” is a smear. Although she does admit that Obama is aloof, dismissive and has an air of a prince of privilege. Coming from a left wing dilettante like Dowd, that is quite an assessment.
And therein lays the essence of one of Barak Obama’s biggest weaknesses, he carries an air of condescension that is normally not appealing to the American electorate. Just ask John Kerry, Al Gore and Michael Dukakis. Except that Obama is far worse than any of those presidential losers.
Last week, the issue raised its ugly head when Jesse Jackson whispered into a hot mic that he would like to castrate Obama for “talking down” to blacks. Which raises the question: Who doesn’t the Prince of Privilege talk down to?
Americans were first treated to the Obama arrogance en masse, when he told a group of San Francisco liberal elitists that Americans in the heartland cling to God and guns out of desperation. Those remarks put the Reagan Democrats demographics in jeopardy for the Democratic nominee.
Female Clinton supporters also smelled the Obama condescension odor towards women. Just ask Geraldine Ferraro what she thinks of Obama's condescension towards women. Many have referred to Obama as a misogynist. This feeling was reinforced when Obama called a female reporter “sweetie” when she addressed a pointed question to Obama.
Lately, some Clinton supporters have borne the brunt of the Obama arrogance when he told them to “just get over it” referring to the Democratic primary. They believe that Obama is paying lip service to the idea of “unity” in order to get their money.
As well, Obama has taken extraordinarily arrogant steps in his campaign. In addition to creating his own presidential seal, he has proposed making a campaign speech at Germany’s Brandenburg Gate, a spot traditionally reserved for world leaders, and has moved his acceptance speech from a "smallish" in door 19,000 seat convention center to a 75,000 seat outdoor stadium. Obama’s camp told network news execs to get over it, when they balked at the cost of moving their operations to include the new venue.
Even Obama’s wife Michelle exudes arrogance and contempt for the little people. Yesterday she sneered at the government tax rebate checks being sent to Americans as part of a bi-partisan stimulus package, as to small. You could buy a pair of earrings with the $600.00 checks but not much else, she told the assembled crowd.
One has to wonder if we Americans are worthy of Barak Obama. As Michelle told one crowd, this is our only chance to get Barak. He won’t run for President again. I don’t know whether to genuflect or kiss his ring.
Posted By:Brian Goettl @ 7/13/2008 8:24:00 PM
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